


THE 
HEALTHFUL ART OF DANCING 



The 
Healthful Art of Dancing 

By 

LUTHER H. GULICK, M. D. 

Author of 
"The Efficient Life," and " Mind and Work" 

Illustrated jrom photographs 




New York 

Doubleday, Page & Company 

1910 






ALL RIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION 
INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN 



COPYRIGHT, 1910, BY DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 
PUBLISHED, SEPTEMBER, I9IO 



©GI.A273<i9(' 



PREFACE 

In "The Efficient Life" and "Mind and Work" 
I discuss the truth and importance of the optimis- 
tic point of view, and among other things urge more 
attention to judicious exercise and the wholesome 
expression of ^lappy feelings. In this little book 
I aim to give a constructive treatment of one of the 
resources for the expression of the joy of life, a 
resource that is related to health, vigour, and 
beauty — dancing. 

Luther H. Gulick. 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. The Point of View .... 3 

Division I — Conduct 

II. Dancing as a Part of Education . . 13 

III. The Practical Conduct of Folk Dancing 
as a Recreative Measure in a Great 
City 31 

"IV. The Results of Experience .... 55 

Division II — Physiology and Psychology 

V. The Physiology of Dancing ... 99 

VI» Exercise Must Be Interesting . . . 116 

VII. The Place and Limitations of Folk 
Dancing as an Agency in Physical 
Training 130 

VIII. Athletics for Girls — Biological Con- 
siderations 147 



viii The Healthful Art of Dancing 

CHAPTER PAGE 

IX. Neuro-muscular Coordinations Having 

Educational Value 163 

X. The Return of the Dance .... 187 



Division III — Philosophy 

XI. Folk Dancing as an kri 203 

XII. Elements of the Dance 215 

XIII. Rhythm 227 

APPENDIX 

REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE ON FOLK DANCING, 
PLAYGROUND ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA 



ILLUSTRATIONS 

"The Highland Fling" as an Exercise for 
Efficiency Frontispiece 

FACING PAGE 

Russian Peasant Dance 6 

Greek Zachlorn Dance 7 

Reap the Flax 14 

The Roofs of the New York Public Schools as 

Being Used for Dancing 15 

Hungarian Solo or Czardas ; 16 

Group of Girls Dancing on a Cement Platform 
Opening into the Girls' Outdoor Gymnasium, 

at Chicago 17 

Bean Setting 18 

London Bridge 19 

This is the Way We Wash Our Hands ... 20 

When I Was a Teacher 21 

Ostrich Dance 24 

Keys of Canterbury 25 

Keys of Canterbury 28 

Three Dukes A-riding . 28 

Bacca Pipe 29 

Swedish Singing Game 32 

Swedish "Klapdans" 33 

ix 



X ILLUSTRATIONS 

FACING PAGE 

All In 34 

Enjoyed by Old as Well as Young in Sweden . 35 

Miss Elizabeth Burchenal 52 / 

The Irish Jig . 53 

Girls of the Manhattan Trade School ... 64 • 
Greek Play Given at Manhattan Trade School 

for Girls 65 

The May-pole Dance at Central Park, New 

York City 66 L^ 

Children Forming a Daisy 67 . 

Private Dancing Class at Chicago Beach 
Hotel 70 

Greek Dance 71 

Sailors' Hornpipe 78 

School Children — Pageant 79 

Norwegian Spring Dance 82 

Irish Lilt 83 

Boys from a Chicago University Dancing a 

Swedish College Students' Dance ... 88, 89 V 

Irish Lilt 92 

Tyroleon Dance 93 

"The Czardas" 102 

Mr. Chalif in a Russian Dance 103 

Normal Students of St. Cloud, Minn., Danc- 
ing a Morris Dance Out-of-doors . . . 110 
Private Class of Miss Hinman's in Chicago . Ill 
The Spirit of the Dance 114, 115 



130, 131 



ILLUSTRATIONS xi 

FACING PAGE 

Dances Being Evolved by Children to " 

Fit Hurdy Gurdy Music . . . 
Children Dancing in the Street . . 

Highland Fling 

Reap the Flax 

Kahiarno 

Reap the Flax 

Highland Fling 

"The Farmer in the Dell" 131 

Esthetic Dancing, Boston Normal School of 

Gymnastics 146, 147 

A Dutch Kermess 194 

Virata Dance 195 

Orsa 196 

Typical Scene in Swedish Household . . . 196 
La Cachucha — A Spanish Dance .... 197 
A Festival — Midsummer Night's Dream . . 208 

Midsummer Night Pole 209 

Daily Occurrence on the Green at Naas at 

8:30 p. M 210 

A Midsummer Night's Dance 211 

Ernest Thompson Seton's Boys' Camp . . . 216 
Ernest Thompson Seton's Boys' Camp — Per- 
forming the Snake Dance 217 

Isadora Duncan 220 

Isadora Duncan and the Dancing Chorus . . 221 



INTRODUCTION 

When we ask those who have studied 
the history of our kind, to point out to us 
the time and place in which human Hfe 
has been most brilHant and full, with extra- 
ordinary unanimity they tell us that during 
eight hundred years the people of Greece 
lived lives of unexampled attainment, and 
left a record in literature, poetry, drama, 
legislation, sculpture, which has never yet 
been even approached by any other people 
in any other period. When we turn to 
the records of this people and search the 
wi'itings of her wise men, in the endeavour 
to find the answer to the question as to 
what form of education it was which pro- 
duced these balanced and brilliant lives, 
we are told that one of the fundamental 
and essential elements was dancing; that 



INTRODUCTION 

dancing which united body and soul in 
the expression of high emotion; that danc- 
ing which represented in social form those 
virtues which it desired to stamp upon the 
soul. These sages say that through these 
cadenced rhythms, these expressions of 
strong and virtuous emotions, that poise — 
mental as well as physical — becomes 
wrought into the tissue of character. 



THE POINT OF VIEW 



The 
Healthful Art of Dancing 

I 

THE POINT OF VIEW 

CHILDREN have always danced. 
Dance games such as "All Around 
the Mulberry Bush" have contributed their 
share of happiness in the lives of the children 
of the world. 

Young people have always danced. The 
Virginia Reel, for example, has added its 
share of wholesomeness in the social rela- 
tions of young people, and has revived in the 
memories of the old recollections of happy 
youthful relationships expressed through 
this group dance. 

The peoples of the world have always 



4 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

danced. The feelings of a tribe, a people, 
are expressed in the war dances of the 
Indians, in the wonderful funeral dance 
pageants of ancient Greece. Seasons and 
weather; birth, marriage, and death; trades 
and professions — all the vivid parts of life 
have been represented by each people in a 
particular dance form. 

Dancing is the most universal of the arts. 
Practically every one possesses the capacity 
of learning to express feeling through the 
dance. 

Dancing is not only the most universal 
of the arts, but the mother of all art. Out 
of the rhythm of body-movements has grown 
the sense of rhythm and balance that under- 
lies art as portrayed in music, sculpture, 
architecture, painting. 

Dancing is a language, particularly of the 
feelings. Like other forms of language, 
it is a means, not an end; a vehicle, not a 
load; a possibility, not a value. It may 



The Point of View 5, 

express that which is good or that which is 
bad, the pure or the impure. The value 
lies in the "worthwhileness" of that which 
is said. 

In America we have so completely for- 
gotten the deeper possibilities of the dance 
that the word in general use has come to 
have but one meaning, namely, a man and 
a woman holding each other and performing 
an exceedingly simple whirling movement 
to music set in four-four or three-four time. 

While our American nation includes in 
it representatives from most of the peoples 
under the sun, we possess less of the folk 
music, the folk dances, folk lore, folk games, 
folk festivals of the world than do any of 
the peoples of which we are made. The 
reason lies partly in that these folk expres- 
sions are social inheritances carried by a 
community as a whole; when individuals 
migrate the social customs are lost. But, 
whatever be the cause of our poverty in 



6 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

these directions, our need of social customs 
is great, and the growing movement toward 
a restoration of them in forms suited to 
the present day is promising. 

I believe that America is to be the land 
of the greatest, most potential, and perhaps 
the last blending of human stock and also 
of social inheritances. Hitherto we have 
welcomed the wholesome individual or 
family immigrant and have magnified his 
economic value to us and our economic 
value to him; but we have not understood, 
cared for, or even thought about the precious 
social heritage that the immigrant might give 
us — a heritage of art, of story, of music, of 
the dance. 

We are in the midst of a great move- 
ment to resurrect the valuable parts of the 
race inheritances. As an illustration of the 
extent to which the movement has already 
taken practical form let me mention that 
in New York City selected folk dances 



The Point of View 7 

are now being taught to girls in the public 
schools as a required part of the curriculum, 
and that such dances were taught last winter 
(1908-1909) to over thirty thousand girls 
in the elementary schools. It will take but 
a generation of work in this direction to 
bring us again in full possession of our 
own. 

The spread of the folk dance is significant 
because of the effect that it has upon the 
two-step and waltz. All over America the 
society dances are being modified; they 
are being made more elaborate, more inter- 
esting. 

This book aims to present criteria and 
standards regarding the place of folk danc- 
ing in every-day American life — in the 
school, on the playgrounds and in the home. 
It aims to interpret the movement, to show 
that which is good and why it is good, and 
to indicate for the purpose of introducing 
this element into American life practical 



8 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

measures that experience has proved suc- 
cessful. 

Some of the material here presented has 
already been used elsewhere under the 
following titles: 

"Exercise Must Be Interesting," being 
the Presidential address read at a meeting 
of the American Physical Education Associ- 
ation held December 26, 1906; "The Place 
and Limitations of Folk Dancing as an 
Agency in Physical Training," a paper read 
before the Second International Congress of 
School Hygiene, held in London, England, 
August, 1907; "Dancing as a Part of Edu- 
cation," appearing in The World's Work, 
October, 1907; "Neuromuscular Coordina- 
tions Having Educational Value," appear- 
ing in the New York Medical Journal of 
October 17, 1908; "TJie Girls' Branch 
of the Public Schools Athletic League of 
New York City," an article in the Proceed- 
ings of the Second Annual Playground Con- 



The Point of View 9 

gress held in New York City, Septeniber, 
1908. 

Some of the discussions in the book 
overlap in subject matter, but I have allowed 
them to stand as they are because each one 
presents the subject from a particular and 
a different point of view. 

If we can enrich childhood by giving to 
our children dance games; if we can give 
young people wholesome, interesting, and 
beautiful group activities; if we can add 
to the social resources for the leisure time 
of adults — then this movement for the 
resurrection of the folk dance will be worth 
while, for it will help to make life more 
vivid, happy, and wholesome. 




^ 



Division I 
CONDUCT 



II 

DANCING AS A PART OF EDUCATION* 

Happy Results of Rhythmic Play by New 
York School Children 

THE history of the movement for danc- 
ing in the public schools of New 
York is as simple as it is short. In 1905 
an organization was formed for the purpose 
of providing for the schoolgirls of New 
York what the Public Schools Athletic 
League was already providing for one hun- 
dred thousand schoolboys of the city — 
interesting and helpful recreation that would 
have a real part in their lives outside of 
school hours. It set out to cope with one 

♦ This article, written in collaboration with Harry J. Smith, appeared origin- 
ally in The World's Work for October, 1907. It is a general consideration of 
the folk-dance movement as initiated and carried out by the Girls' Branch of 
the Public Schools Athletic League of New York City. Details as to organiza- 
tion, principles, methods and results will be found in Chapter IV. 

13 



14 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

of the biggest problems of this city of cliff- 
dwellings. 

Manhattan children — and this is true of 
the children of all congested cities — have 
almost no place in which to play except the 
streets; but of all the children in the world, 
city children have the greatest need for 
healthy play. It is a matter of the very first 
importance that they should have a chance 
to gain muscular control and bodily dex- 
terity — for the ordinary conditions of their 
life do not provide that — to say nothing of 
the vigour and stimulation that comes with 
right exercise to all the functions of the body 
— the work of stomach and heart, lungs and 
brain. 

Five hours a day in the schoolroom, and 
then the crowded, ill-ventilated tenement 
or apartment house, with perhaps a game of 
tag or hop-scotch or jump-rope in the midst 
of the hubbub and dirt of the street, make 
up the life of the average city child. 



Dancing as a Part of Education 15 

Some school buildings possess gymna- 
siums and playgrounds, but out of school 
hours they do nobody any good. Here was 
the opportunity, if only the right form of 
organization and alliance with the educa- 
tional system of the city could be secured. 
Such an alliance had already been secured 
by the Public Schools Athletic League, and 
the Girls' Branch followed. Under suitable 
provisions for control and regulation, the 
school board granted it the privilege of 
utilizing the splendid new gymnasium equip- 
ment. 

The next question was one of method — 
how to get the best results out of the oppor- 
tunity. Experience has demonstrated over 
and over again that a hundred children 
cannot be turned loose on a tiny city play- 
ground or on the floor of a gymnasium with 
any assurance of all being benefited by it. 
The benefit is never equally distributed. 
The stronger and bigger children will 



16 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

inevitably take possession, monopolizing 
the floor space for their games and athletic 
"stunts," while the shyer, more retiring, 
and less developed children will stand 
uneasily about the edges, looking on or 
playing some quiet, inactive game in a 
corner. Yet these are the very children 
who most need the exercise. 

Organized play of some sort, play under 
control, is the only possible solution, for 
organized play is freer than "free play." 

We are only beginning to learn what 
freedom means. It is not the privilege of 
doing, irrespective of everybody else, what 
one wants to do. That would make the 
tramp the ideally free man. Freedom lies 
in the recognition and joyful acceptance of 
relationships. In organized play, where 
every child is a unit in a larger, mutually 
responsible, and mutually responsive whole, 
all reach a higher and more significant 
stage of individual freedom than is pos- 



Dancing as a Part of Education 17 

sible on the unorganized, free-for-all play- 
ground. 

The problem to be worked out, then, 
was to find the form of organized play which 
would bring the greatest amount of 
good to each child. Careful tests have 
proved that it could not be found in gym- 
nastics. There one has the element of 
control, but it's not play. Gymnastics 
have their place, and an important one, 
in the routine of the school day. They 
offset some of the unavoidable, bad effects 
of the schoolroom life — the constant bend- 
ing over desks which tends to produce 
rounded shoulders and narrow chest, the 
enforced bodily inactivity, the imperfect 
ventilation; but gymnastic exercises are 
primarily for the body. Play is for the 
whole child — for his heart, mind, and 
imagination, as well as for his arms, legs, 
and chest. 

Play is far more important than mere 



18 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

muscular activity. It is the most natu- 
ral and the most potent expression of 
the child's personality. The future lies 
in it. 

When the proposal was made to take up 
dancing in the schools as an exercise for 
girls, three things were said in its favour, 
and all were worth considering. The first 
was that in the limited space of the gym- 
nasium, the roof playground, or the school 
basement, a larger number of children 
could be handled at once in a dance than 
in any other way. The second was that 
in a given space there was more real, all- 
around physical exercise in dancing than 
in gymnastics or any team game. And 
the last was that in the few instances where 
it had already been tried elsewhere, the 
children had become enthusiastic about it. 
That was a strong argument; for it must 
never be forgotten that the object of the 
undertaking was primarily to develop the 



Dancing as a Part of Education 19 

play spirit. Anything perfunctory would 
therefore defeat its own ends. 

So the experiment was made merely as 
an experiment. A teacher was secured who 
loved the work and who believed in it, and 
a few after-school classes for little girls in 
the lower grades and for those in the gram- 
mar schools were started. A number of 
New York women of influence and posi Ion 
gave it their support. It needed that 1 ind 
of backing — moral, social, and financial — 
and such women as Miss Grace Dodge, Miss 
Catherine Leverich, Mrs. Clarence Mackay, 
and Mrs. James Speyer deserve a large 
share of the credit for the success of the 
enterprise. It was a new departure, and 
it took real conviction and hard work to 
win a place for it and to get it under way. 

Less than a year has passed, but already 
the number of classes has grown to 68, and 
between two and three thousand children 
are getting instruction. More than 175 



20 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

teachers, all of them from the regular staff 
of the public schools, have voluntarily 
taken hold of the work, without pay, giving 
up hours of their scanty leisure to it — and 
a New York teacher's out-of-school leisure 
is a precious commodity. 

These classes come after school. The 
roof playground, high above the chimneys 
and dangling clotheslines of the neighbour- 
hood, is a favourite place for them, unless 
the weather forbids. There is a piano up 
there that can be rolled in and out, and 
clear open air and sunshine — good things 
in New York — are all about. 

As soon as school is out, the children come 
trooping up, laughing and expectant. 
Books, lunch-boxes, and wraps are thrown 
gaily aside; some of the more ambitious 
girls, who want to do the thing properly, 
hustle into tennis shoes and deftly hop out 
of their skirts, standing forth in *'gym" 
bloomers, the admiration of all eyes. Then 



Dancing as a Part of Education 21 

the line is formed, the teacher gives a few 
directions, and the piano strikes up. It 
would be hard to describe the dances them- 
selves. One has to see them to get an idea 
of the kind of spell they possess for the 
children — how every muscle of their bodies 
responds accurately and eagerly to the exhil- 
arating, well-cadenced rhythm of the music; 
how the dancers move back and forth, 
gliding, hopping, or tripping, crossing and 
recrossing, now fast, now slow, according 
to some intricate scheme at which an out- 
sider can only stare in wonder; with how 
much zest and abandon all the mimicry of 
the Swedish and Russian folk-dances is 
entered into — the slaps on the face (that 
do not slap), the quaint cajolery, the digni- 
fied ceremoniousness, the whole gamut of 
mimic social life. 

The music, too, is always appropriate. 
It is the music that has grown up with the 
dance and belongs to it — the strange 



22 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

harmonies and peculiar rhythm of a Slavic 
chardos; the spirited, sharply accented air, 
with the bagpipe drone imitated in the 
bass, of the "Highland Fling." 

The fun does not last for more than 
twenty minutes, and another group of girls, 
waiting their turns, take up the places of 
the dancers. But the children have some- 
thing to carry home with them — a really 
significant experience. The noisy, crowded 
street and the dingy tenement will be hap- 
pier places because of the healthy, full- 
blooded rhythm that still pulsates through 
their bodies — and through their souls, too ; 
for it means that they have a new feeling 
about life: it is "the little white bird" that 
is going to keep on singing in their hearts. 

At least that is what those of us who 
have watched developments closely are 
beginning to believe. And if this is true in 
New York, the very storm centre of our 
civilization, the place where our national 



Dancing as a Part of Education 23 

ideals are most relentlessly brought to bay, 
where every fallacy is most pitilessly forced 
to light in the working out of a new social 
order, then it is certain that the movement 
will reach out to the children of other cities 
as well. 

For all those who have interested them- 
selves in this new movement, it has been 
a revelation. The school-teachers who first 
volunteered to give up an hour a week of 
their precious time to learning folk-dances 
and to teaching them to squads of children 
did so because they thought it would be a 
good thing for the girls. Many of them 
have since declared that the dancing-hour 
is the hour in the week to which they them- 
selves most eagerly look forward; that it 
does them more good, and somehow means 
more to them than anything else they have 
undertaken. 

The ancient Greeks understood the signif- 
icance of these things better than we. In 



24 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

their eyes the body and the mind were a 
unity, inseparable, interdependent, to be 
developed and perfected together, and in no 
other way. In the education of every 
Athenian youth, music, athletic training, 
and dancing had a part. The theory is 
beautifully stated in one of Plato's dialogues: 
"Rhythm and harmony are made familiar 
to the souls of the youths, that they may 
grow more gentle and graceful and har- 
monious, and so be of service both in words 
and in deeds; for the whole life of man 
stands in need of grace and of harmony." 

Rhythm is a fundamental principle of life, 
perhaps the most fundamental. The stars 
swing through heaven in rhythmical rela- 
tions with one another; the sea rises and 
falls in rhythm; the human heart keeps 
its measured pulsations in the very centre 
of our being. All our normal bodily func- 
tions work best in rhythm. In poetry, in 
music, in everything that man knows that 




Courtesy of Miss Hinman Photog-raph by Florence Stevens 

game: keys of Canterbury 
action: "o, sir, i will accept of you a 

BROIDERED GOWN" 




Courtesy of Miss Hinman Photograph by Fior/nce Stc 

game: keys of canterbury 
action: "walking round holding up gown' 



Dancing as a Part of Education 25 

is highest and most beautiful, in all the 
supreme products of his imagination, there 
is still to be found some expression of this 
eternal principle. 

Yet it is not the intellect, the part of us 
that understands, so much as it is the body, 
the part of us that feels, which responds 
and vibrates in the most vivid unison with 
this principle. And it is the body which 
has always first sought to show it forth, to 
make assertion of it, to put itself actively 
into sympathy with it. 

Dancing is an expression of this desire. 
It is the most primitive of the arts. The 
rudest savages practise it, making it an 
essential element in every religious observ- 
ance, in every festival of the tribe. Their 
emotions inevitably take form — give them- 
selves concreteness and actuality — through 
the dance. Marriage, death, harvest, spring, 
rain, every stirring event of tribal existence 
is so celebrated. It is a universal language. 



26 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Now it is a commonplace of psychology 
that, after a fashion, every child repeats 
in his own individual development the long 
history of the development of the human 
race. He is the human race in miniature. 

Logic would lead us to expect that the 
emotional life of the child would seek to 
embody itself in some of the same forms that 
are normal and instinctive to uncivilized 
peoples. And this is exactly what we find 
to be true. 

Childhood is the time when the physical 
nature is most sensitive to rhythmical move- 
ment. Children love even the meaningless 
swing of 

"Ene, me-ne, mi-ne, mo!" 

The words which the Australian uses in his 
tribal dances, so anthropologists tell us, 
often make no coherent sense at all; for 
everything has been sacrificed to the 
rhythmic accent. 



Dancing as a Part of Education 27 

Our modern little folk, so hilariously 
singing : 

*'A tisket, a tasket, a green and yellow 
basket," 

have no idea what those magic words 
may portend, or what they have to do 
with sending "a letter to my love. " 
That does not matter at all. 

They can never keep still when the hand- 
organ man comes around. It is a pretty 
sight to see a crowd of happy youngsters 
on the city street, dancing and skipping for 
joy about the hurdy-gurdy. And they 
invent dancing games and songs for them- 
selves, this small race of poets and mimics, 
never minding what the sense may be, if 
only they get a chance for active rhythmical 
expression. 

Surely this is the golden time in a man's 
life, if there ever is one, for the cultivation 
and development of this wonderful sense — 



28 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

a sense which, if it is once given its due, 
opens up many avenues into what is beauti- 
ful and noble. 

So far the scheme has been formally 
adopted in New York only for girls. 
Whether, under present conditions, equally 
good results could be obtained in classes 
for boys is not altogether clear, though some 
of the more vigorous hornpipes and flings 
have been tried with them with great 
success. But there is the right moment for 
the beginning of any new movement. At 
present the schoolboys of New York have 
a highly organized system of athletic games 
which is bringing splendid results, both for 
those who are naturally athletic and for 
those who would keep altogether on the 
outside. An innovation may not be desir- 
able at this time. 

Neither is it yet certain just what dances 
will prove the best suited for our American 
conditions. Some of the spirited and char- 





i 


^g 


t vJH 



Courtesy of Miss Hinman Photograph by Florence Stevens 

game: keys of canterbury 
action: "and walk along with me anywhere" 




Courtesy of Miss Hiinnan Plioto^rraph by Florence Stevens 

game: three dukes a-riding 
action: "you're all too black and dirty" 



Dancing as a Part of Education 29 

acteristic folk-dances of Sweden and Russia 
have so far seemed to make the very greatest 
appeal to the children. Great care is always 
taken to have the accompanying music 
appropriate and distinctive, for the music 
and the dance are organically related. 

Adaptations and changes there must of 
course be. The dances are intended to 
meet the needs of American children; they 
must relate themselves to American condi- 
tions; and much of their value would be 
lost through too strict an adherence to 
the traditional letter of the performance. 

Our national temperament, enthusiastic 
and spontaneous, needs just such an outlet 
for its surplus emotional energy. But one 
thing is certain: any such growth must be 
from within. There would be small use 
in instituting a festival if there were no inner 
festival spirit. In the New Orleans Mardi 
Gras, in the Harvest Homes of some Western 
cities, with their pageants and ceremonies. 



30 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

in the Carnival at Quebec, in the vividly 
remembered Dewey Reception in New 
York, in the religious and national observ- 
ances of all European countries, we see 
rational and appropriate expression of this 
spirit. 

There is every reason for believing that 
a country in which the children had been 
given a chance to develop their natural 
instinct for rhythmical and harmonious 
activity would have a national life far 
richer, deeper, and more beautiful than 
one where the main emphasis in education 
was upon bare intellectual training for the 
purposes of "practical success." It is at 
least worth thinking about. 




Ill 



THE PRACTICAL CONDUCT OF FOLK DANCING 

AS A RECREATIVE MEASURE IN 

A GREAT CITY 

IN THE previous chapter a general account 
has been given of the work of the 
Girls' Branch of the Public Schools Athletic 
League of New York City. The subject 
is now to be discussed in a more technical 
and detailed manner. Folk dancing is 
here considered from the standpoint of a 
special set of conditions, namely, those 
surrounding the exercise and recreation of 
girls in the public schools of New York 
City. 

When the subject is considered from 
other standpoints, for instance from the 
social standpoint, other dances than those 
indicated here will obviously be needed. 

31 



32 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

The Virginia Reel, while it possesses small 
value as exercise, does possess high social 
utility. 

THE girls' branch OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS 
ATHLETIC LEAGUE* 

The problems involved in athletics for 
girls are far more difficult than are those 
that are involved in athletics for boys, 
because in connection with the latter there 
is a long history of experimentation which 
has demonstrated conclusively many impor- 
tant facts. Athletics for girls rest upon a 
relatively new and as yet to a large extent 
experimental basis. 

The emphasis in the girls' athletic exer- 
cises is now chiefly placed upon those events 
in which classes or groups as a whole com- 
pete. The exploitation of the individual 
is generally avoided, both in dancing and 

♦Prepared for the Second Congress of the Playground Association of 
America. 



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§ 


^B' 1 


W 


m^m^} : 


1 
1 


k ^ 


1 



As a Recreative Measure 33 

in the athletics. Throwing the basket ball 
for instance is the only event in which the 
individual appears as such. It is believed 
by the ladies who are directing the work 
of the Girls' Branch that one of the most 
important lessons which girls need to learn 
— and one for which but small opportunity 
is afforded them for learning — relates to 
the nature and advantage of cooperation, 
of team work. 

During practically all of woman's history 
she has been primarily identified with the 
home, rather than with the community. 
Her identification with the community has 
come through her husband and her children. 
Hence it has been both necessary and inevit- 
able that those qualities which depend upon 
such individualistic action should have been 
most developed. But in the new era, which 
is already upon us, the same demands with 
reference to the larger movements of the 
community are being made upon women as 



34 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

have been made upon men; yet the same 
opportunities are not being given to women 
for learning the lessons of cooperation. 
Boys have their team games, their gangs, 
whereby in rough though effective way they 
learn the laws of united action in ways 
which hitherto have been closed to girls. 
The simple games advocated by the Girls' 
Branch depend upon the cooperative endeav- 
ours of a group of individuals and they 
are thus indicative of the newer movement 
that belongs to our century. The necessity 
for this work does not merely or mainly 
rest upon a demand for physical vigour, 
quickness, health, and skill developed by 
the exercises; it rests fully as much upon 
the moral qualities involved in the team 
play. The social aim is thus quite as 
prominent as is the physical one. 

The contests are arranged between classes 
in schools. They are not performed in 
public, but are carried on either in private 



As a Recreative Measure 35 

or before an audience of the school, consist- 
ing of the parents and friends of the contest- 
ants. In the development of athletics for 
boys public competition has been a large 
factor. Whether or not it will ultimately 
become equally a factor in athletics for girls 
it is as yet too early to say, but the convic- 
tion is very strong among the Board of 
Directors of the Girls' Branch that the time 
has not yet arrived for the general pub- 
lic display of competitive athletic sports. 
Exception was made in such a case as the 
exhibition for the playground congress, 
because in no other way did it seem possible 
to adequately propagate the idea which is 
back of the movement. But even there 
school was not pitted against school. The 
intense rivalries and jealousies which are 
so often aroused by such competitions, 
the exceeding exaltation of victory and the 
bitterness of public defeat were avoided. 
In the athletic sports of the girls, as well 



36 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

as in the folk dances which are character- 
istic of all the work done by the Girls' 
Branch, there are certain fundamental prin- 
ciples of selection. These are: 

1. All the individuals shall take part. 

2. No one individual shall be placed in 
a position which is so important as to render 
other individuals relatively subordinate. 

3. The exercises shall be of a measur- 
ably all-round character, involving not 
merely all parts of the body, but they shall 
develop the qualities of skill, quickness of 
perception, readiness to meet emergencies, 
and the like. 

During the early days of the Girls' 
Branch experimental work was carried on 
along three lines — athletics, gymnastics, 
folk dancing; and a careful record was 
kept as to their utility. It soon became 
evident that of these three, folk dancing was 
the most interesting; that by a judicious 
selection of dances a larger number of chil- 



As a Recreative Measure 37 

dren could secure exercise in limited space 
and time than in either of the other forms 
of exercise; and that the folk dances 
afforded opportunity for cooperation with 
other activities of school and home in a 
way not afforded by either pf the other 
activities. 

Gymnastics as compared with athletics 
showed similar differences, except when in 
the hands of teachers having exceptional 
skill and enthusiasm. The athletics proved 
to be the more interesting. The daily 
gymnastics of the children in the school- 
room seemed to be measurably adequate 
for the'accomplishment of the ends for which 
school gymnastics primarily exist, which 
are: to combat the effects of the sedentary 
life of the child and the effects upon posture 
of the school desk. Athletics, while they 
do not have in them those exercises that 
tend to correct tl^e effects of the school desk, 
do primarily affect the vital functions of 



38 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

respiration, circulation, and digestion in a 
way that is most benejScial. Accordingly 
the work of the Girls' Branch has centred 
upon athletics and folk dancing. 

Principles of selection. A study of the 
various dances used by the peoples in differ- 
ent parts of the world quickly revealed the 
fact that many of the dances were not suited 
to the objects sought by the directors of the 
Girls' Branch. In some of the dances, 
for example, but few individuals are danc- 
ing at a time, the rest remaining still. This 
means a waste of time. An excellent exam- 
ple of this is the Virginia Reel, known also 
as Sir Roger de Coverley, a dance interesting 
in itself, admirable from the social stand- 
point, but lacking from the standpoint of 
physical exercise. Therefore, one of the 
first principles of selection was the picking 
out of those dances in which most of the 
individuals are active most of the time. 

Then, again, some folk dances require 



As a Recreative Measure 39 

for their performance more space than is 
commonly available in the gymnasium, the 
school basement, or the schoolyard. Thus 
space, as well as time considerations, are in- 
volved in the selection of each dance. Those 
dances are chosen which can be done by the 
largest number in the most limited space. 
' As far as possible dances have been 
selected which involve large movement 
of the trunk, arms, and limbs. This 
requirement at once removes from the pos- 
sibility of use such a large group of dances 
as that represented predominantly by the 
dances from Java, which in large measure 
concern themselves with small movements 
of the wrist. 

Another consideration is that the body 
positions in the dances shall be graceful 
and such that do not tend in any way to the 
forming of habits of movement or posture 
that are disadvantageous from the stand- 
point of health. As an illustration of the 



40 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

dances that have been avoided on this 
account may be cited those Indian dances 
in which for a considerable portion of the 
time the body is bent forward, the individual 
dancing with bent knees and in a crouching 
position. While it has not been possible 
to avoid such positions altogether, no dances 
have been selected in which these postures 
are predominant. 

Another most important consideration is 
that the dances shall be sufficiently simple for 
children to learn without an undue amount 
of training. 

It has also been found necessary to avoid 
using a large number of folk dances because 
of their unsuitability from the emotional 
standpoint. For example, the love dances 
of the East, however beneficial they may be 
from the standpoint of the body movements, 
are entirely unsuitable from the stand- 
point of their emotional content and their 
relation to the morals of our civilization. 



As a Recreative Measure 41 

It will thus be seen that the range of 
available folk dances meeting the various 
conditions is comparatively small. While 
the Girls' Branch does teach folk dancing, 
it does not by any means advocate an indis- 
criminate teaching of all the folk dances 
of all the peoples. The work consists only 
in teaching those folk dances meeting the 
physiological, moral, and social require- 
ments that have been mentioned. 

In the consideration of these questions, 
it is believed, the dangers of dancing have 
been met to a large extent. It is recognized 
that there are many people who are not 
only fearful of dancing, but who see in it 
genuine evil. That to which those persons 
object is also objected to by those who have 
the management of the Girls' Branch. 
The experience of the last few years indi- 
cates clearly that the joyous freedom of 
the dances which are suitable from the 
various standpoints mentioned tends to 



42 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

minimize rather than to increase the dangers 
that were anticipated from the start. The 
attractiveness of the dance hall has been 
lessened for those who can have in school 
the beautiful old-world folk dances. 

Another and an entirely different aspect 
of the case is also important. The parents, 
as they come to school and see their children 
taking part in the dances of the various 
races, have come to feel that there exist 
between themselves, their children and the 
historic past of their peoples ties which for- 
merly had not been appreciated. On the 
other hand, the children who are doing 
the dances which their parents have done 
as children and as young people, coming 
to understand something of the meaning 
of the dances, have had interpreted to them 
in a way which it is hardly possible to accom- 
plish by any other means their ancestral 
history. These dances constitute a real 
tie between the old and the new. 



As a Recreative Measure 43 

The conservative treatment that has been 
given to these folk dances has resulted in 
an entire absence of that criticism which 
is so commonly made against dancing. 
It was expected when the folk dancing was 
undertaken by the Girls' Branch that there 
would be a considerable body of conscien- 
tious people who would seriously object 
to it. But when the basis of selection of 
the dances was seen and the fact was 
realized that the dancing was tied up with 
the school and the home life, that the 
dances were selected with regard to suita- 
bility from the moral and social, as well as 
the physiological standpoints, the critics 
have not merely refrained from criticizing 
but have joined those who were in support 
of the movement. 

Dancing, like every other form of art, 
has its grave possibilities of danger. The 
success of the movement in its early 
stages in New York, which has been 



44 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

so marked, has been due, not only to 
the wisdom of the Board of Directors 
of the Girls' Branch, but also to the 
fact that these directors were ladies of 
such standing in the community as 
to warrant confidence that what they 
would advocate would be thoroughly judi- 
cious and conservative. The ladies con- 
stituting the first board of management were 
as follows: 



Mrs. Richard Aldrich 
Mrs. Archibald Alexander 
Mrs. Francis M. Bacon, Jr. 
Miss Jessie H. Bancroft 
Miss Josephine Beiderhase 
Mrs. \Ym. C. Demorest 
Mrs. George Dickson 
Mrs. Cleveland H. Dodge 
Miss Martha L. Draper 
Mrs. Charles Fairchild 
Mrs. Charles Farnsworth 
Mrs. Daniel Guggenheim 
Mrs. S. R. Guggenheim 
Mrs. Edward G. Janeway 



Mrs. John Bradley Lord 
Mrs. Clarence H. Mackay 
Mrs. Charles F. Naething 
Mrs. Henry Parsons 
Mrs. Henry Phipps 
Miss Julia Richman 
Mrs. Earl Sheffield 
Mrs. Lorillard Spencer 
Mrs. James Speyer 
Miss Margaret Stimson 
Mrs. I. N. Phelps Stokes 
Mrs. Felix Warburg 
Miss Evangeline Whitney 
Mrs. Egerton L. Winthrop 



Miss Catherine S. Leverich 



As a Recreative Measure 45 

The first discussion as to the importance 
of learning those lessons of subordination of 
the individual and cooperation of the group 
was formulated by Miss Grace H. Dodge 
at the initial meeting of the organization. 

The Girls' Branch, like the Public Schools 
Athletic League itself, was at first entirely 
a volunteer body, having no official relation 
to the Department of Education. It still 
exists in that position; but in the course of 
study as adopted by the Board of Education 
during the winter of 1907-1908 many of 
the steps involved in the folk dances taught 
by the Girls' Branch are taught also in the 
grades. Hence the children come to the 
classes for folk dancing measurably pre- 
pared to take up the work systematically 
without having to do the detailed introduc- 
tory work which formerly was necessary. 
The steps of the folk dances which have 
been adopted as part of the course of study 
are optional, so that in any school where 



46 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

the principal or teachers prefer on any 
grounds to devote the entire time to formal 
gymnastics, they are at liberty to do so. In 
this way it has been possible to avoid 
antagonizing those who have conscientious 
scruples against work of this kind. 

The work has been carried on in the 
main through the grade teachers. It is 
obviously impossible for a private organi- 
zation to furnish instructors for any large 
part of the three hundred thousand girls 
in the public schools of New York City. 
Accordingly, the policy was adopted of 
offering to the grade teachers instruction 
in folk dancing one hour a week, provided 
they in turn would teach the girls of their 
own classes or schools for an equal period 
of time. During the first year, which was 
largely experimental, about two hundred 
girls were thus brought under instruction, 
during the second year something over 
three thousand, and during the third year 



As a Recreative Measure 47 

over seven thousand. The latter figure 
does not include the very much larger 
number of those who received instruction of 
a more or less similar nature in connection 
with their regular physical-training courses. 

It is also important to note that instruc- 
tion in these folk dances has been adopted 
as a part of the physical-training work in 
the New York City high schools for girls. 

Thus it will not be many years before a 
large part of the young people of the city 
will have had, through the schools, that 
instruction in folk dancing which has been 
the birthright of practically all peoples of 
the earth, and which we in America have 
so far failed to include as a part of the 
heritage of the children. 

The Girls' Branch was fortunate to secure 
the services of Miss Elizabeth Burchenal, 
whose skill in the selection of dances and 
whose enthusiasm as a teacher have been 
a large factor in the success of the move- 



48 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

ment. The cooperation of the Board of Ed- 
ucation in this work is indicated not only by 
the adoption in the course of study of many 
of the steps which are a part of these folk 
dances, but also by the appointment of an 
assistant inspector of athletics who gives her 
whole time to the organization of this work. 
The careful consideration which was given 
to this large group of problems is indicated 
by the following statement from the Girls* 
Branch and by the letters from the President 
of the Board of Education, the City Super- 
intendent of Schools, and the President of 
the Public Schools Athletic League. 

EXHIBITIONS OF FOLK DANCING AND ATH- 
LETIC COMPETITIONS 

Recommendations of the Girls' Branch of the 
Public Schools Athletic League of 
New York City 
In the development of the good which we 
see in the physical exercise for girls, includ- 
ing folk dancing and athletics, we recognize 
that there are certain real dangers. Our 



As a Recreative Measure 49 

problem is to secure the good results without 
fostering the evil possibilities. We believe 
that the dangers may be avoided, at least 
in large measure, by the following steps: 

1. By having the folk dancing for school 
and social purposes only. It does not seem 
to us wise to cultivate in girls the idea that 
they can earn money by exhibiting their 
dancing. We do think that the exhibition 
of folk dancing at the schools on the 
occasions of parents' meetings and at school 
functions where the friends of the girls are 
invited is not only desirable, but useful; 
but we feel so strongly that when such exhi- 
bitions form part of pay entertainments the 
idea of the stage may be introduced and may 
become prominent, as to lead us to say that 
it would be better to eliminate these dances 
entirely, rather than to cultivate this idea. 

2. By having the work of such nature 
that it can be done by large classes; for, the 
exhibition of one or even a few girls in 
special work leans in the same way toward 
the stage. We feel strongly that the trend of 
our work should not foster this idea. 

3. In the folk dance the use of the 
national costumes of the country from which 
the dance is taken adds to its beauty, but 
we believe it would be better that such cos- 



50 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

tumes should not be used. If paid for by 
the girls themselves it would introduce a 
social class distinction between those who 
could afford to buy them and those who 
could not. This would be unfortunate. 
If the costumes are paid for by the teachers, 
they would make a further demand on 
their resources. This, we think, would be 
equally unfortunate and is far from our 
wish. The chief artistic element in the 
costume is that of unity, giving to all the 
members of a class that impression of 
homogeneity which is one of the basal 
principles of art. The same effect can be 
accomplished by the use of a simple decora- 
tion, such as a uniform coloured ribbon in 
the hair, a sash, a scarf, which might be 
made of cheesecloth or some other inexpen- 
sive material which would not be a burden 
of expense to any girl. 

The use of the costumes also tends to 
make the folk dancing more of an exhibition 
when it really is merely a form of exercise. 
Whenever possible it is desirable that 
the girls wear bloomers and suitable shoes, 
which allow greater freedom in exercising. 

4. From the first we have clearly realized 
and have tried to guard against that noto- 
riety which is one of the serious dangers of 



As a Recreative Measure 



51 



athletics. We believe firmly in wholesome 
exercise and in a reasonable degree of 
competition, but wish to avoid the notoriety 
which would inevitably attend inter-school 
games. We believe that the competitive 
spirit can be adequately exercised by games 
between teams within classes, and between 
the classes within the school. Therefore, 
we deplore all competition of basketball 
and other games of a similar nature between 
teams from separate schools; but this, of 
course, would not interfere in any way with 
the meeting together for social purposes and 
in the participation in friendly sport of 
pupils from different schools when under 
the auspices of their own teachers or parents. 

/ Catherine S.Leverich,Pres. 
Grace H. Dodge 
Martha Lincoln Draper 
Laura Drake Gill 
Annie W. S. Low 
. Kathryn Mackay 
\ Fannie Griscom Parsons 
Caroline S. Spencer 
Ellin P. Speyer 
Edith M. Phelps-Stokes 
Emmeline Winthrop 
Jessie H. Bancroft 
Julia Richman 



Signed: 



Committee 
on Recom- 
mendations 



52 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Department of Education, 

The City of New York, 

Office of the City Superintendent of Schools, 

500 Park Avenue 

May 20, 1907. 
Miss Catherine S. Leverichy President, GirW 

Branch, Public Schools Athletic League. 
Dear Madam: 

I have read with care the suggestion it is 
proposed to send under the auspices of the 
Public Schools Athletic League to principals 
of schools with regard to exhibitions in folk 
dancing. 

I most heartily endorse every recommen- 
dation made in this communication. The 
communication is returned. 
Very truly yours, 

William H. Maxwell, 
City Superintendent. 

Board of Education, 
Park Avenue and Fifty-ninth Street 
New York, May 9, 1907. 
Miss Catherine S. Leverich, President, Girls* 

Branch, Public Schools Athletic League. 
Dear Madam: 

While I have been greatly interested in 
the work of the Girls' Branch of the Public 




Photograph by Alice Boughton 

MISS ELIZABETH BURCHENAL 



As a Recreative Measure 53 

Schools Athletic League, I have been afraid 
that there might be danger in some cases of 
the instruction in folk dancing resulting in 
directing the attention of the children to 
performing in public and to stage dancing. 
The recommendations of the Girls' 
Branch, which I have just read, seem tome 
therefore most judicious, and I trust will 
be generally followed. 
Very truly yours, 

Egerton L. Winthrop, Jr., 
President, Board of Education 



Public Schools Athletic League of the City 

of New York, 

20 Nassau Street 

New York, May 15, 1907. 
Miss Catherine S. Leverich, 500 Park Ave- 
nue, New York City. 
My dear Miss Leverich : 

I have carefully considered the recom- 
mendations of the Girls' Branch of the 
Public Schools Athletic League which you 
forwarded to me in your letter of the 14th 
inst. 

In a matter of this kind I should allow 
my judgment to be controlled by that of 
ladies such as those which compose your 



54 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Executive Committee, as I think they are 
more competent than any man can be 
to determine what is best for the girls. The 
suggestion of your committee that costumes 
should not be used, excej)t some simple 
decoration to secure uniformity; that exhibi- 
tion should not be given in large classes, 
and that the exhibition should be made as a 
form of physical exercise, rather than an 
exhibition of dancing, has my decided 
approval. 

Very truly yours, 

George W. Wingate, 
President, Public Schools Athletic League. 




IV 

THE RESULTS OF EXPERIENCE 

SO FAR in this study of dancing the 
argument has been based chiefly on 
theoretical considerations. The strongest 
arguments, however, for or against, are 
found in the test of experience. Many 
a measure which has promised well from 
a 'priori considerations has been found 
to fail at some quite unsuspected point 
when put to this, the crucial test. In 
order to secure records of experience at 
first hand that might be presented in this 
connection, facts were sought from a 
number of persons who either were using 
the folk dances, or, as principals of 
schools, were in a position to watch the 
effects of the dancing. The following let- 

55 



56 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

ter was the means of securing the desired 
information : 

Dear Friend: 

In connection with a publication that I 
hope to issue soon, I wish to have a brief 
series of statements of the actual results 
that have been achieved through folk 
dancing. I do not mean a discussion of 
the importance of recreation, or of anything 
on the theoretical side. What I need is 
a statement of what the effect has been 
upon the girls who did the dancing: 

1. Did it make them more healthy? 

2. Did they become happier.? 

3. What dances did they perform.? 

4. How many girls took part in them ? 

5. In what way did the social effect of 
these dances show itself.? 



The tests which are of the greatest value 
with reference to the use of folk dancing 
are not those conducted by the trained 
teacher under the favourable conditions 
found in well-to-do homes or schools. The 
real test is found when the dancing is taught 



The Results of Experience 57 

by relatively untrained teachers, with poor 
facilities, to those whose lives are not already 
grounded in aesthetic appreciation. Accord- 
ingly, the answers that were given by the 
principals of schools in New York City 
seem to me to be of peculiar interest : 

OflSce of the Principal of Public School 

No. 177, 

Borough of Manhattan. 

March 15, 1909. 

1. In my opinion, the dancing made the 
girls more healthy. It developed them 
physically and made the awkward ones 
more graceful. 

2. I am enclosing a letter which will 
testify that the dancing certainly made the 
children happy, when withdrawal from the 
class had this effect upon the child. A 
little circumstance in this connection will 
interest you. One of the most graceful 
dancers in the Mountain Dance is a little 
dark-haired sprite. I had occasion to inter- 
view her one day, and found in the course 
of my talk with her, that she lives in a cellar; 
I remarked that it must be dark. She 



58 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

informed me that it wasn't, it had a window 
in the back and one in the front. All that 
this optimistic little lady knew of "the 
heights" came to her in her Mountain 
Dance. In it she was the little leader, 
quite like an elf dancing along in her red 
scarf thrown around her. 

3. Klapdans Russian Dance 
Strasak Hungarian Solo 
Mountain Dance Irish Jig 
Chain Dance Oxdans 

Ace of Diamonds Carousel 
Komarno Morris Dance 

Tarantella 

4. There were about three hundred girls 
in all. 

5. The social effect of these dances was 
evidenced when the children were brought 
together. They were eager to help one 
another, and when the time of a contest 
drew near, in order to win the trophy for their 
particular section, they met outside of 
school to practise the dances. They became 
very much attached to their partners. 
When visiting their friends they were 
frequently asked to dance for them. It 
gave them great pleasure to entertain people 
at their homes in this way. 

Signed, Mary L. Brady, Principal. 



The Results of Experience 59 

Dear Miss Brady: My daughter Leah 
was very happy when she thought she would 
belong to the dancing class. It made me 
happy to see her so glad. But when she 
came back rejected she was the picture of 
misery. She was crying her life away. I 
feel very, very sorry for her myself. She 
does not know anything about dancing as 
I do not let her play outside, but she could 
learn dancing as she is bright in everything. 
Therefore, dear Miss Brady, if you would 
accept her, I would be very very grateful to 
you. I remain, 

Yours respectfully, 

Mrs. L. Shapiro. 



Manhattan Trade School for Girls. 

I have always felt that folk dancing 
was one of the best means of training girls 
to better physical condition. I know this 
from my own experience as my father had 
me so taught in dancing school as there 
was no gymnasium in the town. In the 
Manhattan Trade School, where I have 
had a chance of having more extensive 
dancing than I myself knew, I feel still 
more the valuable adjunct which we have 
in reproducing this interesting exercise. 



60 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

The Bohemian, Hungarian and Russian 
dances, which you mention in your article, 
we use here. We also have dances of a 
more iesthetic character. The fact that 
these dances bring into play the various 
muscles, added to the fact that they have 
in them the worth-while element which 
ordinary movements do not have, makes 
them valuable on their physical side alone. 
The students thoroughly enjoy them, and 
are happy in giving them. They are so 
much more anxious to make these move- 
ments a success — that is, to perfect them 
— than they are movements for themselves 
alone, that they are of greater value. 

One of the difficulties we have at the 
School is a lack of accuracy in the children. 
Each department has to try to overcome 
this. The Art Department and the Aca- 
demic Department unite in efforts to over- 
come this bad defect, and they find that 
the very fact of an effort to make the 
dances a complete success tends to bear 
also on the greater accuracy of the child. 

The group action helps the girls to work 
together and has its social value. 

With the class of girls with which we deal 
there are often bad ideals of what dancing 
is. We find the folk dancing tends to 



The Results of Experience 61 

elevate these notions and to give an appre- 
ciation of what real dancing may mean, 
and also brings sometimes a distaste for 
more vulgar forms of dance-hall entertain- 
ments. Thus we get a moral effect as well. 

There is nothing that I feel to be more 
uplifting in life than to obtain true happi- 
ness through right action. I have often 
wished to tell Mr. Simon Patten, who 
wrote the "New Basis of Civilization," that 
I feel that the sort of happiness which the 
girls obtain in dancing at the school is 
realizing his ideal that the new basis will 
be brought about through our learning how 
to cause happiness, and through happiness 
lead to right action. 

We find the folk dancing in groups to 
be a valuable means of pleasure at the 
noon hour for it combines enjoyment with 
learning to work together, and not to disturb 
others. 

Signed, Mary Schenck Woolman, 

The Manhattan Trade School, 
209, 213 East 23d St., N. Y. City. 

New York Public School No. 131. 

The children of my school are very 
young — we have no grade higher than the 



62 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

fourth year — hence, the children of our 
club are only eight or nine years of age. 
The yards of our school building are 
small and dark, with very low ceilings. 
The only advantage we possess is a piano 
in the yard. We started a class in folk 
dancing and games two years ago as an 
experiment. The work has been so suc- 
cessful that we no longer regard it as an 
experiment. 

Because of our limited yard space we can 
have only from forty to fifty children in the 
club — and to be a member is one of the 
coveted prizes of the school. We have to 
choose the children from the highest grade 
and as these children can remain only six 
months or in rare cases a year in the club, 
owing to the fact that they must leave to go 
to the higher grade schools, I am not able 
to observe the effect of this work on their 
health. 

I can answer most emphatically, however, 
that this club is a source of great pleasure to 
the children. The day when the "Good 
Times Club" meets is the red-letter day of 
the week. May I tell you of one or two 
little incidents which have come under my 
immediate notice.'^ 

We choose the children from among the 



The Results of Experience 63 



il A >> 



A students. Naturally, we get a lot of 
awkward children but as our object in 
teaching the folk dances to the children is 
to provide recreation for them and not to 
attain perfection in dancing, we do not 
consider this. We had one child in the 
club who was particularly awkward and 
seemed incapable of learning the dances or 
even keeping time to music. After much 
labour with this child, the teacher finally 
said, " Yetta, you cannot learn these dances, 
so you'll have to leave the club." The 
next afternoon about 3:30, I passed 
through the yard, which was very dark at 
that time. I saw a little tot with the tears 
streaming down her cheeks, dancing all by 
herself. On inquiry, Yetta told me that 
her teacher said she couldn't belong to the 
club because she couldn't learn the dances 
and so she was practising the steps by her- 
self, "because I do so want I should stay 
in the club." Needless to say that the child 
remained in the club and that we got a 
deeper insight into what this recreation 
means to our children. 

Another afternoon I was walking through 
our crowded district when an organ- 
grinder appeared. Immediately children 
of all ages — even to little babies of two — 



64 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

boys and girls — were dancing the folk 
dances. A prettier sight or happier children 
I have rarely seen. 

One of the happiest days of the club was 
May Day in Central Park. Many of the 
children then saw grass for the first time, 
and to be allowed to dance upon it! 
This was an experience long to be remem- 
bered. 

As to the social effect, I feel that this is 
deep and lasting. In the games there is a 
class spirit developed which has a good 
effect, each child trying to do her best for 
the good of the class. In the annual con- 
tests, we find that the children are learning 
that only one side can win, and to take the 
defeat pleasantly. 

Many of the dances are too intricate for 
our little folks — those that have been 
taught are the following: 

Oxdans Tarantella 

German Polka Shean Trews 

Comarinskaia Two Swedish Steps 

Hungarian Solo Song Games 

Csardas Carousel 

Strasak Komarno I See You 

I feel that I have not been able to give you 
much information, but I wish to be counted 



The Results of Experience 65 

among those who are enthusiastically in 
favour of folk dancing. 

Signed, Ellen Phillips, Principal. 

One of my little tots in the dancing 
club said to me this week, "I belong to 
another club — oh, it's lovely — it's called 
'The Red Ribbons.'" Naturally, I was 
very much interested to hear of this other 
club. It seems that last year we had a little 
girl in our club called Dora Hoeflich, and 
Dora has started this Red Ribbon Club. 
Dora is ten ! The children meet evenings 
at Dora's home and " Dora learns us such a 
lot of dances — more than school ! We 
have to pay Dora a cent a week, for Dora 
is the president and I am the truant officer 
to get all the girls in. When we get enough 
money, we are going to ride away and 
get ice-cream soda. Dora says we save so 
slow, we'll soon have to pay two cents!" 
How like a woman's club, to get its members 
and then raise its dues! Dora's mother 
and father, I understand, are delighted to 
spend the evening watching the children 
dance. This is a little glimpse of what 
these athletic clubs mean to the children 
of brick walls, lower East Side. 

Ellen Phillips. 



66 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Public School 15, Manhattan, 
728 Fifth St. 

Two years ago the folk - dancing class 
was formed. The young teachers who had 
been under Miss Burchenal's instruction 
selected children from all the 5th year classes 
(5A and 5B) to make up the folk-dancing 
club. At first, the children chosen were the 
pupils who were at the head of their classes, 
as the play opportunity would be considered 
the very best sort of reward. It proved to 
be so, and the proudest girl in the class is the 
one who, because of her high standard, can 
say, "I am a member of the Burchenal 
Athletic Club in No. 15." 

We find in many instances a wayward, 
troublesome, idle girl often spurring up to 
a high standard in her class lessons and 
deportment, in order to be permitted to 
enter the folk-dancing class. 

Our school reaches only to 6B and then 
the girls are transferred to 8th grade elemen- 
tary schools in the neighbourhood. The 
greatest reluctance is shown when the time 
comes for their transfer, chiefly because they 
must give up their membership in the 
Burchenal Athletic Club. 

Are the children happier? It has surely 



The Results of Experience 67 

helped to develop a spirit of fun in these 
children. They are all, in No. 15, Jewish 
children — not merry by nature, rather 
depressed and quiet, I think, perhaps because 
of the race's long subjection to other nations, 
but here in the dancing classes my greatest 
delight is to come upon them in their after- 
noon practice time and see their merry, 
happy faces and hear the tone of joy in their 
voices. 

As I walk through the crowded streets in 
the afternoon leaving school, I see the happy 
influence of the club, for I find the big 
sisters teaching the little ones the steps of 
the newest dance right out in the crowded 
thoroughfare. One afternoon I saw a tiny 
tot of not more than two years imitating the 
big sister as she held out her poor little 
bedraggled skirt and stepped through the 
stately mazes of the minuet. The children 
are perfectly happy when they are required 
to remain after school for dance practice. 

The parents, too, are so pleased and 
delighted because their little girls have a 
place to play, and they learn such pretty 
dances. Sometimes at an exhibition of the 
folk dancing I have a Russian mother or an 
Hungarian moved to laughter and tears 
both as she watched her little one with the 



68 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

others, going through the dances of her native 
country. 

I know of only one instance where a 
child's parents removed her from the class 
because of the bad effect on her health, and 
in this case the child was suffering from some 
heart disease. 

Each term there are sixty girls in the club, 
with about forty always taking part in the 
dances and contests. 

The dances performed are as follows: 

Highland Fling Frykdalspolska 

Shean Trews Csardas 

Irish Jig Oxdans 

Irish Lilt Strasak 

Lot ist Tod Komarno 

Klappdans, Comarinskaia 

Trollen Baby Polka 
Minuet 

I, personally, as principal of this large 
school in the city's most crowded district, 
feel that the influence of the Girls' Athletic 
League has been a most gracious one, put- 
ting happiness and joy into the lives of these 
little creatures who for the most part are 
doomed to live without play. 

May the work that you are interested in as 
Chairman of the Playground Extension 



The Results of Experience 69 

Committee succeed far beyond anything 
we have yet hoped for, and may playgrounds 
be extended all over this great city, for the 
good of our little folks who are housed in 
the crowded tenements or jostled in the 
busy, dirty streets. 

Margaret Knox, Principal. 

February 16, 1909. 
Last winter (1908) Miss Hofer gave a 
very interesting course in folk dancing 
to our Training Class for Playground 
Directors. The dances were much enjoyed 
by the members of the class, who were 
enthusiastic over them. We used these 
dances on our playgrounds the following 
summer with more or less success. Many 
of the dances given by Miss Hofer were too 
elaborate to be practical and the very simple 
games and dances were much the most 
popular, a game or dance beginning with 
a few children and growing gradually, 
being more popular than those which 
brought all the children into activity at once. 
The dances were opposed on almost every 
ground at first, and liked better and better 
as they grew more familiar. The leader- 
ship and personality of the director counted 
much. We found several dances and games. 



70 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

brought us by the children themselves from 
the streets, the most popular of the games. 
The music and words of these games I am 
sending to Miss Burchenal. 

You ask what we feel is the effect of these 
dances; I think we all agreed (the general 
director of the games, the individual 
directors of the grounds and myself as 
supervisor) that the effect of the dance was 
beneficial. Physically, it improved the 
children in poise, lightness of step and grace. 
Socially, it broadened their interest in each 
other and enlarged their vision. Morally, 
it brought much happiness, kindness, spirit 
and less selfishness. In fact, we could see 
improvement in every direction. This 
relates entirely to the girls; with a few 
exceptions the boys never took part. At one 
of the grounds a number of small boys 
seemed to enjoy the dances, but this was 
unusual. 

Mary B. Stewart, Supervisor 
Children's Playground Association, 
Baltimore, Md. 

There was this difference in the folk 
dances and games. The dances if used 
often became tiresome — interest fagged — 
while there was always a demand for games. 




Courtesy of Miss Hinman 



GREEK DANCE 



The Results of Experience 71 

certain games being played for weeks at a 
time. The gain in skill, endurance, alert- 
ness and ability to connect individual inter- 
ests with group interest was due almost 
entirely to the games. 

Girls who through timidity or lack of 
knowledge of the game, or both, often stood 
on the outskirts, got a good deal of pleasure 
out of dancing the folk dances which did 
not call for the initiative that many games 
demand. Some of our girls really blos- 
somed out in the folk dances. 

Anna M. Morgan 
Rutgers Preparatory School, 

New Brunswick, N. J. 

I find it necessary to do a great deal of 
choosing and selecting, rejecting at least ten 
dances for every one which I have found 
usable. Those which I have used are 
to be recommended chiefly for three things. 
First, they are simple to comprehend and 
to execute, therefore being practical for 
large classes. Second, they are sufficiently 
vigorous to stimulate circulation and to 
bring into play most of the larger muscles. 
Third, the general character of the dances is 
such as to promote a spirit of fun, good fel- 
lowship, and happiness throughout the class. 



72 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Those of my teachers who are engaged in 
kindergarten work find valuable material 
in the folk games and songs, which appeal to 
the child's dramatic instinct. Personally, 
I have had no experience in working with 
very small children — with classes of older 
women, the folk dances are a great rejuv- 
enator. 

Sara S. Sargent 
Glencoe, 111. 

In regard to the folk dances, I have 
used them constantly in our gymnasium 
with university girls since I returned from 
Sweden in 1898 and I have had nothing but 
the very best results. I find that the girls 
are more interested in them than in the 
more artistic dancing such as the Gilbert 
work; this is partly due, I think, to the fact 
that more girls can adapt themselves to this 
form of dancing without appearing awkward 
than they can to the artistic work — then, 
too, the element of recreation in all of these 
folk dances is very attractive to the pupils. 
I find that the physical effect is good — 
nearly every muscle of the body being 
brought into play some time during the 
dance. They have the tendency to break 
up social cliques which are so often found 



The Results of Experience 73 

in large gymnasium classes. I find, too, 
that there is a greater amount of exhilaration 
resulting from these dances than from 
most of the ordinary gymnastic games. 
In my summer work I have noticed with 
much interest of late that the demand for 
these dances is increasing each year — this 
demand coming largely from public school 
teachers who are not regular gymnastic 
teachers, but who are realizing the value 
of them for public school work. 

Anne Barr Clapp 
University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Neb. 

In my other classes, we teach aesthetic 
as well as folk dancing and, judging from 
limited experience, I should say that the 
aesthetic work is better for physical develop- 
ment and is more interestmg to each individ- 
ual, but that the moment we turn to folk 
dancing there is more gaiety and sociability 
in the class. The dancing in groups brings 
together members of a class who might 
dance side by side all winter in the aesthetic 
dancing, without speaking to each other, 
but in the folk dancing, all become 
acquainted. I should call it an excellent 
mixer. 



74 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

It certainly makes girls and middle- 
aged women happier. My classes have 
performed : 

Clap Clap Bow Ace of Diamonds 

Shoemakers Strasak 

Bleking Gilbert School Dances 

Helen Storrow 
417 Beacon St., Boston, Mass. 

I think the first requisite in dances for 
the young is simplicity; second, they should 
cultivate the imagination; but neither of 
these at the expense of grace and correct 
poise. I find that so many simple dances 
contain elements that are crude, awkward 
and even ungainly. The attitude and posi- 
tion of the body have a reacting effect upon 
the mind and character, and there is never 
a physical reason of sufficient importance 
that can justify the use of the crude. Such 
folk dances, therefore, as can instruct or 
uplift and that contain the incentive to 
joyous abandonment will produce healthful, 
happy childhood; they will bring to the 
adult glimpses of childish days and a 
momentary return to youth. In conclusion, 
I think everything depends upon the charac- 
ter of the dance. That they are healthful 



The Results of Experience 75 

would seem to be unquestionable; their 

moral effect, with the suggestions indicated, 

will be to uplift, and the social instincts of 

courtesy and grace can be developed just 

in proportion as these two characteristics 

are emphasized in the dance itself. . . . 

Clara G. Baer, 

The Tulane University of Louisiana. 

H. Sophie Newcomb, Memorial College, 

New Orleans, La. 

Dancing is taught in all the leading 
settlements in Chicago ; that is, Hull House, 
The Commons, Northwestern University 
Settlement, etc. This is a combination of 
ball-room and folk dancing. 

During the twelve years I taught the 
dancing at Hull House the two most strik- 
ing results were: first, the men gained the 
American attitude of respect for women, 
which they knew nothing of in their life in 
the other country; and second, they 
learned the value of self-respect. By letting 
the young people come for one evening a 
week in a clean, well-aired hall, with good 
music, good floor, and rules of politeness 
and formality maintained, they lose their 
desire to go elsewhere for this necessary 
social intercourse. They here gain healthy 



76 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

exercise, social intercourse in a pleasant 
setting and enough social technique to make 
them self-respecting. There seems to be 
no better, quicker, or surer way of obtaining 
our first hold on the young people we want 
most to bring off the street. These young 
men and women who crave social life seem 
to have no proper way open to them. 

It was astonishing to find how many 
young men and women were given better 
positions by their employers after attending 
class for a month or two. They had added 
a bit of *' reliability" to their character. 

The children's classes at the settlements 
show immediate results in the new interest 
felt in the old home life of their parents. 
We always teach the foreigners their own 
dances as far as possible. This new bond 
of sympathy and respect is alone worth a 
winter's work. One settlement to which I 
went had been unable to affect the young 
people in their attitude of disrespect — 
almost of shame in which they held their 
families. One evening I brought a number 
of young people from the University of 
Chicago, and we danced their own folk 
dances. We threw all the life into them 
that we could, describing which part of the 
country the dances came from, and how that 



The Results of Experience 77 

special country had much to be proud of 
in its wonderful variety of beautiful folk 
dances. During the evening the boys 
whistled tunes they had learned at home, 
and before we knew it they were showing us 
several dances their grandparents knew, and 
we all played their ring games, and the entire 
attitude of the young set changed toward 
their elders. Something their parents knew 
was of value after all. 

I am emphasizing this point of value in 
the folk dancing for girls and boys because 
the other results are evident to the most 
casual observer — that of concentrated joy, 
healthy exercise, grace, interest, control, 
and the wonderful feeling of self-respect that 
comes to each child when he has finished a 
dance and can produce it passably well. 

FOLK DANCING IN THE PRIVATE SCHOOLS: 

Folk dancing is in the curriculum as a 
regular study in the following schools in 
Chicago, under my personal direction: 

Chicago Latin School for Girls — each 
group of twelve pupils has one half-hour a 
week. This has been so for the last four 
years. 

University School for Girls — each group 



78 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

of eight girls has forty minutes. This has 
been so for four years. 

The Kenwood Institute — groups of fif- 
teen girls who have one half-hour a week 
each. This work has been going on for the 
last three years. 

The Electa School — groups of twenty 
girls who have one half-hour per week. 
This work has been going on for two years. 

The University of Chicago Elementary 
School — Each grade from the first to the 
eighth has three-quarters of an hour lesson, 
in groups of thirty-two, with the exception of 
the first grade which has only a half-hour 
lesson. These grades contain boys and 
girls. In the sixth, seventh, and eighth 
grades the girls of each grade are given an 
extra three-quarters of an hour per week 
for more advanced gymnastic dancing, 
where they do the Spanish and French 
dances, which are impossible to teach with 
the boys. 

The University of Chicago High School 
— all the Freshmen and all the Sopho- 
mores are required to take dancing once a 
week. They are divided into groups of 
fifty and their period is three-quarters of an 
hour. Once a week, on Friday afternoons, 
the two gymnasiums are thrown together 



*.T*p^^^, 


r 


'■rjt ■ 

y. • ■ ;■ 


.,^1?'^ <M. .^^-^ 





The Results of Experience 79 

and the whole high school is given an hour 
and a half of informal dancing followed by 
a cotillion. 

I began this work in Professor Dewey's 
small school, called the "Dewey School," 
nine years ago, and went with him into the 
University, now called the University of 
Chicago Elementary School. The work in 
the high school is in its sixth year. It was 
introduced by Dean Owen to meet the 
problems of girls' societies and fraternities 
and those who were not members, and to 
insure social intercourse between Jew and 
Gentile, rich and poor. 

The results obtained by teaching folk 
dancing and gymnastic dancing in the 
private schools are as follows: Concentra- 
tion of attention, gained by necessity for 
quick grasp of direction. Alertness, neces- 
sary for application of direction. Leads 
to excellent coordination of physical and 
mental powers. Results in rhythmic move- 
ment and so in grace and harmony of 
motion. Its value mentally lies in increase 
of concentration, of alertness ; physically, in 
gain in mental control of physical organism. 
Wonderful exercise full of keen interest, 
which calls for the most absolute concentra- 
tion of the day. One girl said to me to-day, 



80 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

** Dancing is in itself happiness; it gives to 
me an outlet for expression that nothing 
else affords." They actually do their steps 
everywhere, in the halls, on the sidewalks 
and then in the evening for their families. 

I asked the girls to-day as they passed 
out of one class to express in a few words 
what gymnastic dancing meant in their 
lives. The following are some of the an- 
swers : 

*'The folk dances are not only delightful 
in themselves, but are interesting in the way 
they express the different character of the 
nations. The soft grace of the southern, 
and the stiff, jerky motions of the northern 
exhibit such a variety that one never tires 
of them." 

"Fancy dancing has meant everything to 
me. It has improved my ball-room dancing 
and given me a sense of rhythm." 

"Dancing has helped me in all athletics 
to do whatever I had to do more easily; 
for example, to walk better and to do more 
things and not get tired." 

"Gymnastic dancing means more to me 
than anything else in the way of exercise. I 
love it, adore it; it makes me feel so joyful. 
I think it is absolutely wonderful. It is so 
exhilarating. I cannot say enough about it." 



The Results of Experience 81 

"Gymnastic dancing is my favourite 
kind of exercise, and I look forward to each 
lesson with keen interest." 

The work in the Elementary School con- 
sists of appropriate folk dances, which 
correlate with their history, art and music. 
Thus, in the first grade we lay great stress 
on rhythm. 

Under Miss Allen in the kindergarten the 
children have a splendid start in the work, 
and in the first grade they become capable of 
distinguishing the four necessary rhythms — 
that is, waltz, two-step, polka and gallop, 
and clap them accurately. They learn the 
steps which lead to the execution of these 
dances and do simple ring games, such as 
"Shoemaker," "Silent Circle." They also 
begin work on the time and place for bows, 
shaking hands, etc. 

We review this work, and add to it up to 
the fourth grade, where they have accom- 
plished the waltz, two-step, gallop and barn 
dance, eight or ten ring games, and have 
acquired the technique of manners — they 
are now an established habit. 

In the fourth grade they take their first 
folk dance of any length — the English 
"Sailor's Hornpipe." At this time they are 
interested in England ard her colonies and 



82 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

have read about the great navigators; 
consequently the dance is full of meaning 
to them. 

In the fifth grade the "Spinning Dance" 
is worked out. This depicts the process of 
spinning from the gathering of the flax to 
the testing of the cloth and correlates with 
their textile work. They also take the 
Vingaker's Barn Dance from Sweden, which 
is illustrative of their reading about the 
peoples of the Scandinavian Peninsula. 

In the sixth grade the boys and girls enjoy 
the "Highland Fling," which gives them a 
tremendous amount of physical exercise, 
and they like the concentration demanded. 

They take up here the intergrade parties, 
and begin to put into practice the formalities 
they have learned to use toward one another. 
They meet people well, can introduce, take 
care of a visitor with responsibility, and are 
given opportunities of serving on com- 
mittees. 

The girls in this grade have an extra 
period each week of three-quarters of an 
hour by themselves. In this we have 
the loveliest time! The little girls wear 
bloomers and ballet slippers, and for three- 
quarters of an hour dance to their heart's 
content the Cachucha, the Highland Fling, 




Coiirte:iy of Miss Hin 

NORWEGIAN SPRING DANCE 



The Results of Experience 83 

Re Jane, Mountain March, and as they all 
declare, it is their "favourite study." Each 
little girl looks forward to this day and hour 
all week long. 

The seventh grade use the big *' Weaving 
Dance," because of the training in unison 
gained by this group work. They, of course, 
..^yitinue their work oa the waltz and two- 
step and folk dances. The girls of this 
J grade have an extra three-quarters of an 
{J hour each week, and take more advanced 
dances than the sixth grade. 

In the eighth grade we try to develop 
the real spirit of social intercourse. They 
learn the Lilt, the Buck and Wing and two 
or three short dances which take different 
numbered groups, like the Virginia Reel in 
groups of six, the Vingaker Barn Dance, 
taking two girls and a boy, and the Gaiety, 
which takes a girl and a boy. 

The first year we had dancing in this 
grade it was most discouraging. There 
were a number of big, over-grown boys who 
thought it a disgrace to possess any manners; 
who could not and would not learn to dance 
if there were any possible way out of it. 
The girls danced badly and were dreadfully 
"silly." It took all the first year to gain the 
interest, and consequently the good work 



84 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

of the class, and it was one of the hardest 
years I have ever gone through. 

The following year gave us better results, 
because we had enough children come up 
from the seventh grade, who had had the 
work with me the year before, and had 
learned to respect and enjoy it. Each 
consecutive year has found the work easier 
to handle, until now the work runs smoothly, 
and they are a responsible and responsive 
group. The pleasant part of this is that the 
result is felt by the entire school, as their 
attitude toward each other and every one 
else is very much more "livable." 

During Christmas vacation several mem- 
bers of the seventh grade met me, volun- 
tarily, at a settlement near our Stock Yards, 
to help entertain at an old people's party. 
Three times as many boys came as girls 
and when we gathered in the dressing room 
for a consultation as to what we should 
dance, we found there were not enough girls 
to go round. The nice boys cheerfully sug- 
gested taking the girl's part, although they 
had never practised in that way. So we 
ran hastily through the dances to see if we 
could make the right turns. Then out they 
ran on to the stage, utterly unconscious 
of doing anything unusual. They had on 



The Results of Experience 85 

sweaters and high skating shoes (you know 
what boys in the seventh grade are generally 
like), and it was amusing to see them hop 
around doing the girls' parts in some of the 
folk dances. But the old people enjoyed 
it, and nodded and tapped in time with the 
good old tunes. The boys realized the 
enjoyment' they were giving and worked 
doubly hard to make it go. One little girl 
had looked into the dressing room when we 
were rehearsing and, seeing the boys doing 
the "Highland Fling," said she knew that 
dance. So when the boys finished their 
dance, we asked her to come out of the 
gallery and show us her steps, which she did, 
much to the joy of our boys and the old 
people. We then asked all to join in one big 
circle, and, do you know, almost all of those 
dear old people rose, and we did lovely 
simple marching figures, where these boys 
of mine marched hand in hand with those 
they had been trying to entertain, and 
we ended by playing a simple ring game. 

Now this whole situation would have 
been made impossible if these boys had not 
gained through our training this idea of 
social life, the appreciation of these people 
through a knowledge of their national 
dances, and the feeling that they actu- 



86 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

ally possessed something that would give 
pleasure. 

In the University of Chicago High School 
six years ago, there were several conditions 
which instead of improving were constantly 
being emphasized and spreading, such as 
the fraternities and sororities. These gained 
a place of importance in the young people's 
minds to an extent that made the carrying 
out of any new plan almost impossible 
without the sanction or applause of these 
select bodies. Those who "belonged" were 
taken up with social duties inside their 
little group, and those outside wished to be 
*'in" to such an alarming extent that they 
dared not associate with the unchosen, as 
it might spoil their slender chance of being 
taken "in" later. This worked both ways 
for evil, for it shut those in who were in, and 
it cut those out of everything who were out ; 
and as Miss Jane Addams says : " We know 
instinctively that if we grow contemptuous of 
our fellows, and consciously limit our 
intercourse to certain kinds of people whom 
we have previously decided to respect, we 
not only tremendously circumscribe our 
range of life but limit the scope of our 
ethics." 

Then there was the problem of taking the 



The Results of Experience 87 

Jew into any social life. The fraternities 
and sororities looked to the most exclusive 
"society" to point out the right step, and 
they (the leading societies) closed their 
doors to the Jews. Then of course no one 
outside dared enjoy the friendship of their 
fellow-students for the simple reason that 
no one "outside" wanted to appear different. 

Added to these two conditions, the boy 
and girl who came to school in an automo- 
bile, dressed well, and could entertain, 
were sought after by all the "societies"; 
and the boy and girl unhampered by worldly 
riches found a hard road to hoe unless they 
were athletic, musical or dramatic to a 
sufficient degree to be a desirable addition 
to the society. 

Our young people were building for them- 
selves the worst condition of things, socially, 
imaginable. To meet the three foregoing 
problems — to break down the upper and 
lower class barriers, to give each child an 
equal right to social life, to take the running 
of the social events out of the hands of 
6 per cent, of the school and place it within 
the reach of 90 per cent. — we intro- 
duced folk dancing and an open social 
hour. 

The first year (six years ago) was trying 



88 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

and most difficult. In the first place, a 
surprising number of boys and girls did not 
dance well enough to feel any joy in coming 
to the "open hour." Only 10 per cent, 
of the school danced with ease ; to be exact, 
only one boy out of the entire high school 
of five hundred pupils could really waltz 
correctly. The other boys danced the two- 
step waltz. To remedy this condition, 
we put in dancing as a required period 
once a week for all Freshmen and Sopho- 
mores in groups of forty to fifty. This 
plan worked well — for now every one 
must know how to dance; they cannot 
escape it; and all the young people enjoy it 
now that they really know how. We give 
them line work of clogs and jigs, and have 
those who first succeed in learning the steps 
pass out of line and help those who are hav- 
ing trouble. This breaks down all feeling 
of self -consciousness, and also allows the 
class to keep more even. 

These classes at first were shunned by 
all the boys, and they made every possible 
excuse to escape them during the first and 
even into the second year, but now they 
come to more classes than they should; 
in fact, they come in whenever they have a 
study period unless we watch very carefully. 




' MiM Hi:!, nan 

BOYS FROM A CHICAGO UNIVERSITY DANCING A 
SWEDISH COLLEGE STUDENTS' DANCE. THIS DANCE 
REPRESENTS THE HAZING OR INITIATION OF A 
FRESHMAN BY A SOPHOMORE (oX DANCE) 




Courtesy o/Miss Hinman 

BOYS FROM A' CHICAGO UNIVERSITY DANCING A 
SWEDISH COLLEGE STUDENTS* DANCE. THIS DANCE 
REPRESENTS THE HAZING OR INITIATION OF A 
FRESHMAN BY A SOPHOMORE (oX DANCe) 



The Results of Experience 89 

The Juniors and Seniors, who are not 
supposed to take this work, register for it 
and one of the Seniors said to me the other 
day: "Do you remember when I was a 
Freshman, several of our class thought it 
silly to dance and tried to get out of it? 
I succeeded in being excused and have been 
sorry all this year and last. May I come 
in now? None of the boys nowadays 
seem to dislike it, and I simply must learn." 

The day we opened our first Friday after- 
noon "Open Hour" the room was crowded 
with young people who had come to see 
what this was going to be like. The fra- 
ternities and sororities were there in full, 
and one fraternity had brought with them 
girls from another high school. Several 
things were made very plain to Dean Owen 
and myself that day: first, no one outside 
of our school would be allowed to come ; 
second, they must come at a given time, 
remain through the hour, and not merely 
come in for one dance with some special 
girl and then go out ; third, they must dance 
with any partner chance gave them in the 
cotillion. We found they slipped by the 
undesirable non-sorority girls and somehow 
managed to gain one of their chosen mem- 
bers for every figure. Later, we succeeded 



90 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

in making them understand that we were 
running these dances for the entire school 
and not for the select few. Several times 
did we do one figure trying to make it come 
out honestly. We were at last successful, 
but the leading fraternity gave the word 
they would never come again to one of these 
dances, " because they did not come there to 
dance w^ith any one, but with those they 
liked"; and sure enough at the next dance 
we were without the "leading lights." 
Of course, we slowly grew smaller and 
smaller, for all the fraternities and sororities 
stopped one after another; and then those 
that were left were ashamed to attend or 
support a school activity that the leaders 
had passed by. They, too, slowly dropped 
out, and by Christmas we had fallen off 
from one hundred and twenty-five to twelve 
couples. These twelve couples remained, 
because they enjoyed dancing for the sake 
of dancing, not because they were danc- 
ing with a certain person. Gradually this 
right-minded and steady group grew and 
grew, until to-day we are the leading activity, 
have become so large that we have to open 
both gymnasiums, and we have maintained 
absolutely the simple rules with which we 
opened. The young people from the fra- 



The Results of Experience 91 

ternities and sororities slowly came back, 
not as groups, but singly, as individuals. 

We have a few boys and girls show their 
special folk dances quite often — that is, 
the Oxdans, the Roy Clog, Buck and Wing, 
and the Dublin Jig, which is their favourite. 
Each week the committee, having entire 
charge of the afternoon, even to the leading 
of the figures, is made up of young people 
from all four years. They introduce the 
new comers, watch to see that all are having 
a good time, and really feel the responsibil- 
bility of the afternoon. This hour has 
accomplished more for the social atmosphere 
of the school than can be shown. It has 
really met and conquered the problems 
which we hoped it would. 

The social classes in and around Chicago 
partially fill the void caused by the Public 
Schools' failure to realize that dancing is 
part of a child's heritage. We conduct from 
thirty to thirty-five classes per week, each 
containing between twelve and eighty pupils. 
In the girls' classes bloomers and ballet 
slippers are worn, and for one hour they 
have the most glorious time of the week. 
The energy they joyfully expend and the 
almost absolute concentration with the 



92 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

wonderful means of expression it affords, 
is unsurpassed by any other winter activity. 
One mother writes as follows : 

"Gymnastic dancing introduced into a 
home of four daughters, has been not only 
a distinct benefit to the health, but a joy to 
the whole group. One small child was shut 
in by self-consciousness as by a stone wall; 
the love of rhythmic motion gave her free- 
dom, enabling her to mingle with her mates 
^and take part in simple public exercises, 
quite simply and with ease. In the case of 
an older girl suffering from the nervous 
strain of a city school, dancing and basket- 
ball with the giving up of one study restored 
perfect health. As a winter recreation tak- 
ing the place of lawn games of summer, 
gymnastic dancing is invaluable, affording 
wholesome merriment and a pleasant change 
from the round-table games which require 
only mental alertness similar to the school 
and office work of the day." 

This from a small girl in one of the private 
classes : 

"Gymnastic dancing means so much 
that I cannot express it. It is interesting 
to me to see and try to do dances that people 
all over the world have done maybe hun- 
dreds of years ago. Then, too, it is so 




Courtesy 0/ Miss Him. 



TYROLEAN DANCE 



The Results of Experience 93 

much fun and exercise. It is not only fun, 
it is something deeper than mere fun. I 
love it with all my heart." 

This from a member of a ladies' class : 

"The lessons I have taken in folk danc- 
ing have given me more pleasure and abso- 
lute joy than any other study I have ever 
had. The combination of exercises and 
music, wherein the body can express the 
rhythm which the music brings out, brings 
a positive exhilaration. Then I find that 
the dancing requires more concentration 
than almost anything else, as one must think 
of the head, the hands, and the body, and 
still keep in time with the music. Alto- 
gether I vote that dancing brings joy and 
happiness." 

This from a little lame girl in one of the 
social classes: 

'*I do not know what it is about my 
dancing lessons that fascinates me; all I 
know is that there is no hour in the whole 
week more enjoyable than the one I spend 
at the Woodlawn Parish House." 

This from one of the guests of the after- 
noon: 

"Dancing to me means an outlet for all 
the poetic emotions which arise within 
me." 



94 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

This from a mother of one of our children, 
who herself is in a mother's class: 

"Gymnastic dancing has, I think, helped 
me to feel nearer my dear little dancing 
girl." 

This from a young woman about twenty- 
five: 

"Gymnastic dancing holds more real 
enjoyment for me than anything else I have 
ever taken up. I look forward to the one 
hour I have of it on Thursdays. I seem to 
forget all my troubles and think of nothing 
but music and the poetry of motion." 

THE NORMAL COURSE 

The Normal Course has filled in Chicago 
a condition that may be peculiar to us, but 
I hardly believe so. Our well-educated 
young women, who come from cultured 
homes, are not satisfied to ornament the 
fireside, but long to be in touch with the 
life of to-day. We select girls who have 
a mental grasp of educational problems and 
are alive to the world as it is. Their work 
carries them through two years. They 
do actual assisting every day at all the big 
classes, read books and write papers on 
how this work applies to the education of 



The Results of Experience 95 

the child, also learning where each dance 
comes from, its history, what influences the 
different countries in their social life, etc., 
and each carries a class of her own in some 
settlement. They are trained to be good 
teachers, good organizers, an addition to any 
faculty, but they are not trained to be solo 
dancers and fancy dancers. They can 
execute their work well, they know their 
technique, but first and foremost, they can 
teach simply and clearly, and keep upper- 
most in their minds the education of the 
child. It is the only school in the world 
of its kind. We cannot take all who apply, 
which gives us the right to choose the very 
best from those who wish to join. Our 
Freshman class numbers twenty. This is 
the school's fifth year. 

It is almost impossible to overestimate 
what this work has meant to the girls. They 
were not content with the fulfilment of their 
family or personal obligations, but are 
striving to respond to the new demand for 
the welfare of the child of the city or country. 

Mary W. Hinman. 

February 18th, 1909. 



Division II 
PHYSIOLOGY AND PSYCHOLOGY 



THE PHYSIOLOGY OF DANCING 

ONE has only to see an experienced 
dancer going through with any of 
the more vigorous and characteristic folk 
dances of the world to realize at once the 
general characteristics of the exercise 
involved. The weight of the body is almost 
always carried by the legs; the body is 
bent and turned in many directions; the 
arms are constantly in motion; and most 
of the work is done by the muscles which 
carry the body and move the trunk. These 
movements are ryhthmical in character 
and involve usually much repetition. The 
effects of learning to dance are quite different 
from the effects of dancing itself. What 
I am describing are the effects of the danc- 



100 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

ing, not the effects of the mental applica- 
tion involved in learning. 

Circulation. Perhaps the most imme- 
diate and noticeable effect is upon the 
heart. The ordinary pulse rate of a per- 
son standing at rest is about 75-80. The 
ordinary pulse rate of a person doing active 
dancing is from 100 to 130, varying of 
course, with the person and the vigour of 
the dance. Evidently the circulation of 
the blood in the entire body has been 
greatly quickened; the contraction of the 
large muscular masses in the thighs and 
body has pressed the blood in the small 
veins onward toward the heart; the twist- 
ings and turnings of the body have had 
a material effect in pushing onward the 
circulation of the blood of the vessels in 
the abdominal cavity; the deeper breath- 
ing movements involved have aided in what 
is called "the aspiration of the thorax," 
which consists in the sucking of the blood 



The Physiology of Dancing 101 

into the trunk during inspiration and forc- 
ing out during expiration. This, a second- 
ary force of circulation, is the aid which 
the act of breathing gives to the circula- 
tion. The heart itself has been stimu- 
lated in several ways to beat more rapidly; 
the blood being poured in from the muscu- 
lar system acts as a stimulus. It is prob- 
able, too, that with the stimulus from the 
brain which causes the muscles to contract 
there is sent out a stimulus which causes 
the heart to beat more rapidly and efficiently. 
We have thus a number of factors com- 
bining to increase the efficiency of the 
circulation. The blood is pressed on by 
muscular contraction; it is sucked into 
the thorax by respiratory movements; and 
is pressed out of the abdominal cavity by 
the bending movements. The heart is the 
primary factor in the circulation and the 
number of contractions and the volume of 
blood expelled at each contraction increase. 



102 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

It is to be noted — and this is most 
important — that these particular effects 
on the circulation do not follow from all 
kinds of exercise but only from certain 
kinds. A person may write on the type- 
writer as rapidly as possible without secur- 
ing the effects upon the circulation which 
I have described. He may take a wad of 
paper in the hand and squeeze it as hard 
as possible and do it repeatedly until the 
forearm becomes painful, but the circulation 
will not be affected in any great degree. 

The forms of exercise which bring about 
extensive changes in the circulation call 
into play the large muscle masses of the 
body for a large number of consecutive 
contractions. The contraction of the 
smaller muscles of the body, while of 
importance from other standpoints, are 
relatively unimportant from the one which 
we are now discussing. The general law 
is this: The effects of exercise on the organic 




Courtesy of My. Chalif 

"the czardas" 
hungarian peasant solo dance 



m 


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mm 


jk 


^ ^fll 




'^^^^^^^^ 


miSBBk 



MR. CHALIF IN A RUSSIAN DANCE 



The Physiology of Dancing 103 

functions of the body are in proportion to 
the number of foot-pounds of energy expended, 
and not to the amount of effort or will or 
energy put into contractions. For instance, 
a person going up two or three flights 
of stairs expends a large arnount of energy. 
He lifts his body -weight some scores of 
feet. The effect upon the circulation is 
great as compared with the effect of swing- 
ing a light pair of Indian clubs or doing 
anything else involving light exercise or 
exercise of merely the smaller groups of 
muscles. 

We see many schemes of exercise in which 
the great bulk of the work is done by the 
arms. The implements are wands, dumb- 
bells, Indian clubs and chest- weights. 
Many of the movements are complex and 
often beautifully done, involving both grace 
and skill, but the smaller muscular groups 
of the arm and shoulder are chiefly called 
into play, so that the total effect upon 



104 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

the circulation and respiration is relatively 
slight. The small muscles do not need 
much blood nor are they effective in press- 
ing the blood current onward. The large 
muscles need for their eflScient contraction 
large supplies of blood — that is, each 
muscle must have blood in proportion to 
its size and vigour. Therefore to have the 
large effects upon circulation, we must 
have contraction of the large muscular 
masses of the body. 

Dancing is therefore one of the most 
serviceable forms of exercise to increase 
organic vigour, for it involves many move- 
ments of practically all of the large muscu- 
lar masses of the body. 

It is not only the circulation of the blood 
which is affected by this exercise of the large 
muscular masses. The lymph circulation 
is also affected. The lymph bathes all 
the cells of the body, holds in suspension 
the nourishment which they need and 



The Physiology of Dancing 105 

takes from them their waste products. 
It is dependent to a large extent on mus- 
cular movements for its moving power. 
The contraction of the large muscles of 
the body aids in a striking way the increase 
of its circulation. The jarring and jolt- 
ing of the body which occurs in so many 
of the dances is a great factor in promoting 
this, particularly in the abdominal organs. 
Respiration. The need of the tissues 
for additional supplies of oxygen when 
contracting vigorously is the ultimate occa- 
sion for that increased breathing which 
we always observe when exercising vigor- 
ously the large muscles. Hard running, 
swimming, dancing, rowing or paddling 
always increase the amplitude and the 
frequency of the respiratory movements. 
Movements, although equally vigorous, of 
the smaller muscles of the body, such as 
those of the hand, do not correspondingly 
increase the respiratory movements. The 



106 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

amount of oxgyen which is demanded by 
the contraction of the smaller muscles is 
so small as to be satisfied without notice- 
able increase in breathing. 

On the other hand when the large muscle 
masses of the thighs and body are brought 
into play, the breathing becomes deeper 
and faster. There is an intimate relation, 
as has been already indicated, between 
the circulation and respiration. Some of 
the increase in the rapidity of the respira- 
tory movements may be due to the heart 
inadequately performing its functions. 
There may be an embarrassment due to 
overcharging on one side of the heart, 
resulting in an uncomfortable acceleration 
of breathing. But among those accus- 
tomed to exercise, do such conditions 
obtain. 

The muscle cells as they contract pour 
into the plasma surrounding them the 
carbon dioxid which has been formed 



The Physiology of Dancing 107 

during the muscular contraction and in 
turn take from this plasma the oxygen 
which they need to continue their vigour. 

This plasma is collected and pressed 
onward by the circulation till it is thrown 
back into the blood stream. At the same 
time oxygen is being taken and carried 
to the parts needing it. This is the reason 
why many consecutive contractions of the 
large muscular masses of the body result 
in deep and rapid breathing when contrac- 
tions of the smaller muscles do not. The 
one produces large amounts of carbon 
dioxid and needs large quantities of oxygen; 
the other does not. The quantity of oxy- 
gen absorbed that is taken from the air 
of the lungs into the blood plasma and 
into the haemoglobin varies in proportion 
to the need of oxygen in the body, rather 
than in proportion to the quantity of air 
inhaled and exhaled with each breath. 

One may by deliberate effort breathe with 



108 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

rapidity and amplitude, making the lungs 
more than usually free from carbon dioxid. 
This, however, will not raise the oxygen 
absorption in the body. The oxygen tension 
in the blood plasma remains measurably con- 
stant. The Way to increase oxygen absorp- 
tion by the tissues is to do work that increases 
the breaking down of oxygen compounds. 
Thus, when more demand for oxygen is 
created, deep breathing results, and this 
deep breathing is effective in promoting 
oxygen absorption. We thus see the fal- 
lacy of expecting to rejuvenate the tissues 
of the body by voluntary deep breathing. 
Such deep breathing may have useful effect 
in strengthening the accessory muscles of 
respiration; or by means of the wide excur- 
sions of the diaphragm moving the abdom- 
inal contents back and forth and thus 
affecting their vigour, but its usefulness is 
not primarily related to increased absorption 
of oxygen. The large excursions of the 



The Physiology of Dancing 109 

diaphragm stimulate the secondary cir- 
culation in the organs which are below it. 
The abdominal organs are alternately 
pressed upon and released. Exercise, 
because it increases breathing, stimulates 
the activity of the diaphragm and thus 
greatly accelerates the circulation of the 
organs below it. 

Digestion. The most efficient single 
means that we have for promoting the effi- 
ciency of the digestive organs is to perform 
labour which makes the body demand 
increased nourishment. Here again we 
are thrown back upon the need for contrac- 
tion of the large muscular masses. This 
is the reason why tramping, rowing, run- 
ning and other forms of vigorous exercise 
are so likely to increase one's hunger, 
whereas practice with a musical instrument, 
prolonged writing either with the pen or 
typewriter, or any other exercise which 
involves the smaller muscles of the body. 



110 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

are not. Exercise of the large muscular 
masses of the body uses up large quantities 
of energy. The body responds by calling 
upon the digestive organs for more effi- 
cient service. 

A secondary factor in increasing the 
efficiency of the digestion is the jarring, 
twisting and jolting of one part of the 
body upon another, such as occur in walk- 
ing, running and dancing, or in horseback 
riding. Man is not naturally a sedentary 
creature. Peristalsis is carried on partly 
by means of the stimuli which are furnished 
when the body is active. This is why 
constipation is such a frequent accom- 
paniment of those who live sedentary 
lives. The intestine lacks one of the 
stimuli which has been its natural aid dur- 
ing all ages in which man has been an 
active worker. Then again, when a man 
exercises vigorously he eats more in bulk. 
This tends to increase the mass of matter 





^^^^^^^^^^^1 


■,.'4^.- ;•- ■ > ^ ^ ::-\ .<.<i'^-^ 


if,' 







The Physiology of Dancing 111 

in the intestinal tract which in turn is a 
stimulus to the peristaltic activity. 

We have two specific ways by which 
these large muscles when exercised vigor- 
ously many times, affect digestion. First, 
by increasing the amount of nourishment 
by a larger consumption of food, and 
second, by increasing the peristaltic activ- 
ity of the bowels, by exercise and by increas- 
ing the bulk of material upon which the 
intestines, particularly the colon, work. 

Temperature Control. When the body 
exercises vigorously — that is, when the 
large muscular masses of the body are con- 
tracted vigorously many times, the tem- 
perature of all muscles involved is raised. 
The temperature of the blood coming 
from those muscles is therefore higher 
than it was when entering the muscles. 
Thus it comes about presently that the 
temperature of the entire body is raised 
and there is a general feeling of warmth. 



112 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

It is necessary that the temperature of the 
body should not vary to any great extent. 
Accordingly the temperature-regulating ap- 
paratus is at once called into play. Mois- 
ture is poured out on the surface of the 
skin which by evaporation keeps the body 
from getting too warm. This temperature- 
regulating apparatus is our chief defense 
against colds. This is as capable of being 
educated as is any other part of the body, 
but its education, like that of every other 
part, is dependent upon use. It is neces- 
sary for us, if we are to be able to with- 
stand variations in temperature, to accus- 
tom our bodies to changes in temperature, 
to heat as well as cold. These changes 
in temperature may be from subjective 
causes, as those produced by exercise, or 
may be caused by changes of the external 
temperature. 

It is my personal belief that because of 
the close association of the emotional life 



The Physiology of Dancing 113 

with the circulation in general, that individ- 
ual has well-regulated circulation whose 
temperature-regulating apparatus works 
most efficiently. He is less liable to abnormal 
disturbances of the emotions, such as 
explosive bursts of anger and the like, 
than is he who is not accustomed to 
sudden temperature variation. Vigorous 
exercise of the large muscular masses is 
thus one of the potent means for maintain- 
ing a balanced life. In referring to colds 
it is not meant that the temperature-regu- 
lating apparatus is the only defense, but 
its vigorous action is one of our principal 
defenses. 

Carriage. One of the most notable 
effects on persons who have taken courses 
in good dancing schools is their grace of 
carriage and of movement. While it is 
not true that the amount of attention 
given to carriage in the dancing schools 
is as great as that given in military training. 



114 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

it is undoubtedly true that the grace of move- 
ment acquired through dancing far exceeds 
that acquired in military schools. It is not 
true that mere strength of back is the 
primary requisite in erect carriage. The 
first essential is good habits, and these 
can only be established by long-continued, 
self -directed activities. My personal obser- 
vation has shown no single thing more 
conducive to good carriage than is the 
training of young people in the forms of 
dancing which involve it. Exercise for 
a few minutes a day in good posture cannot 
be expected to overcome the results of stand- 
ing and sitting the rest of the day in bad 
positions, but the interest of the individual 
is apt to be so profoundly awakened by 
the dancing that the thoughts and feelings 
are carried during the rest of the day. 
This explains the profound effects of 
dancing upon carriage. The dancer loves 
the art and keeps it constantly in mind 



The Physiology of Dancing 115 

throughout the day. School gymnastics 
may be better physiologically and still be 
far less effective in establishing habits of 
posture, because gymnastics are not loved 
and thought about. 

To sum up then, vigorous dancing is 
to be classed with mountain climbing, 
paddling, running, tennis and the other 
sports which are recognized as having 
the deepest effect upon the body health, 
through more efficient circulation, respira- 
tion, digestion, elimination and tempera- 
ture control. It is convenient in its limited 
demands upon space and equipment. It 
is economical of time. It is social in its 
nature. It should prove a valuable health 
measure to many sedentary people. 




VI 

EXERCISE MUST BE INTERESTING* 

THE most signijScant development of 
physical training, and one which I 
believe will come to be generally recognized 
in the immediate future, is a readjustment 
of balance between school gymnastics and 
other forms of physical exercise. 

School gymnastics had their origin in the 
well-recognized needs of the schoolroom. 
Children seated for long periods at school 
desks tend to develop bad habits of posture ; 
a permanent bend of the back forward and 
a flattened chest. Equally or, perhaps, 
even more significant, is the tendency toward 
delayed respiration and circulation, a 

* Presidential address, annual meeting of the Physical Education Association, 
igo6. 

116 



Exercise Must be Interesting 117 

decreasing of the circulation of the blood 
particularly in the liver. The strained 
position of the school desk has the effect of 
lowering the organs in the abdominal 
cavity, of causing the ribs to droop, and of 
resulting in a general sagging of the abdom- 
inal wall . These facts and their significance 
have been known to scientific students since 
the appearance of "Le Ptosis General," 
the classic work of Glenard. 

The unwholesome conditions must be 
overcome by exercise. Games alone can- 
not remedy this particular set of evils, 
because games are lacking in corrective 
effects on posture. The time available 
during the school day, even if the whole of 
it were spent by the children in the school- 
yards, does not suffice for the accomplish- 
ing of the needed results. But even if the 
needed time were available, the mere 
playing of games would not correct bad 
posture. It is necessary to have in the 



118 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

schoolroom exercises which can be given 
to all children at one time, which shall at 
the end of the period leave the children 
quiet and not overheated, and which shall 
in general, accomplish postural results. 
The children must be at the end of the 
period of physical training in a condition 
of body and mind favourable to mental 
work. 

To meet this very real situation, school 
gymnastics with their formal movements 
arose. It is the aim of school gymnastics 
to correct bad posture, to strengthen and 
shorten the abdominal wall, and to over- 
come the other effects of the dampening 
down of the life powers which are incident 
to sitting still with spine bent forward. 

The mistaken tendency has existed of 
regarding school gymnastics as more or 
less taking the larger place in education 
which belongs to plays and games. I 
believe that corrective school gymnastics 



Exercise Must be Interesting 119 

must be retained as a part of the school cur- 
riculum as long as the present school desk 
exists. Gymnastic exercises must be used 
in the schoolroom daily, whether children 
like them or not; but such exercises should 
not be regarded as discharging completely 
the obligations resting upon physical 
training. 

The formal gymnastics of the classroom 
need some elements that shall add to their 
interest. While it is true that under the 
leadership of skilled and earnest teachers, 
children are interested in and influenced 
by formal exercises, it is not true that 
formal gymnastics in the hands of average 
teachers are done in a way to secure 
adequately that good posture which we 
regard as basal, and also that increase 
in circulation and respiration which is 
needed to counteract the effects of long 
sitting still. We need something that will 
awaken the enthusiasm of both teachers 



120 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

and pupils, so that more life shall be thrown 
into the physical work, so that it shall be 
done because it is loved — not because it is 
demanded. 

Education is primarily a modification 
of the self, in order that life's conduct may 
be different and better than it would 
otherwise be. Education means the modi- 
fication of that which Matthew Arnold 
called ' ' three-fourths of life ' ' — conduct . It 
means the bringing of conduct upon a 
level of higher efficiency, of greater enjoy- 
ment. We no longer educate for general 
discipline. We no longer recognize reality 
in the term "general education" (Hanus, 
Thorndike). We now think that conduct 
is our great goal, and we think of conduct 
as being related to interest. We no longer 
make the mistake of believing that in appeal- 
ing to the interests of children we are 
"pampering" them. Our aim is to satisfy 
the interests of children, because those 



Exercise Must be Interesting 121 

interests are significant of deepest needs. 
I am not referring to whims. 

No child should be allowed to go from 
school, any more than a man from West 
Point, with a bad or a bent back. If our 
claim for school gymnastics means anything 
at all, it ought to mean that through school 
gymnastics we are able to secure good 
posture for all children not crippled. In 
the case of bad posture, the greatest dis- 
credit that can be thrown upon any of us 
is the way in which we carry ourselves. 

When we examine our early lives and 
discover that we now follow in the main 
those things that were interesting to us in 
youth, when we see that interests are indic- 
ative of power and that they point out the 
direction that education should take — 
then this whole "pampering" idea falls to 
the ground, because it is evidently erroneous. 

Of what utility would be considered a 
course in English literature which left the 



122 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

student with a feeling of cordial dislike for 
the subject, with a feeling of gratification at 
the thought that he should never again have 
to read a book ? In a case of that kind, we 
should pronounce the course a failure, no 
matter how much subject matter had been 
covered, no matter how much had been 
forced into the mind of the pupil by the 
teacher. We demand that the course in 
English literature shall establish in the pupil 
sets of associations which are sufficiently 
enjoyable to modify the conduct of his life 
— so that he will read. That course which 
does not so modify the life of the individual, 
which does not make him seek good reading, 
is a failure. 

School gymnastics, until very lately, have 
not met this criterion of interest. This 
has been particularly true concerning gym- 
nastics for girls. 

In physical training to a peculiar degree 
it is not merely necessary that the habit 



Exercise Must be Interesting 123 

established shall be interesting ; it must also 
be useful. Unless it is useful, the work 
accomplished may as well have been left 
undone. 

The habit must also be feasible. It is of 
little use to train a man who is obliged to 
live in the city and who will have little 
opportunity for excursions into the country, 
in those sports for which the large expanse 
of space only available in the country is 
necessary. Graduates from school must 
have established in them interesting, useful 
and feasible habits of muscular activity. 

Habit is not established to any great 
extent without interest. This particular 
subject has advanced far since Professor 
James wrote his chapter on "Habit," which 
emphasizes very strongly the importance of 
repetition. The sailors on a man-of-war 
live day after day, month after month, year 
after year, lives of regular physical habits. 
They arise at certain hours and retire at 



IM The Healthful Art of Dancing 

certain hours; they take moderate and 
judicious exercise at stated periods; they 
eat hygienic food. Do those regular habits 
hold the men at the time of shore leave? 
Not particularly. The records of extern- 
ally enforced morality do not show that 
habits of moral life are established merely 
by repetition. 

Habits are sometimes established sud- 
denly. I recall on one occasion going down 
a flight of stairs and bumping my head on 
the casing of the flight above. The next 
time when I descended those steps, I ducked 
my head ; and thereafter I always ducked it 
at that particular place. Thus I established 
a habit suddenly. A gas jet in a certain 
kitchen was two inches lower than the top 
of my head. I hit my head hard once, 
but always thereafter ducked automatic- 
ally when going into that kitchen. There 
again a habit was established by a single 
experience. 



Exercise Must be Interesting 125 

The problem of developing habits of 
exercise in children is somewhat simpler 
than that relating to the establishment of 
habits in other subjects, for it consists in 
directing an already powerful force, usually 
termed the play instinct, and indulging it 
in such manner that it will persist through- 
out life. From a study of animals or of 
savage races, we see that it is through play 
that they have procured the exercise needful 
for the most advantageous carrying on of 
their life processes. It is not necessary here 
to go into the theoretical problems of play. 
Enough has been determined in this direc- 
tion to establish with a fair amount of 
definiteness the place of play in education. 

Thus far school gymnastics have not 
accomplished the great aim of physical 
training, which is to establish habits of 
exercise that are interesting, useful, and 
feasible. 

The difficulty before us is to discover 



126 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

those forms of exercise which the individual 
will keep up through life, which he can 
continue to do under the limited conditions 
of city life, and which are at the same time 
useful to the body. 

To meet these requirements is a far more 
difficult problem than the invention of 
exercises to meet a condition merely physical. 
It involves a complete knowledge of the 
nature of those things in which the main 
interest of the individual lies. 

There appear to be three directions of 
physical activity in which the problem can 
be met : (1) exercise for medical purposes — 
that is, corrective exercise; (2) play, includ- 
ing ceremony, dancing, etc.; (3) labour. 
For the past seven years it has been my 
endeavour to construct a curriculum of 
play, athletics, and dancing that shall meet 
the conditions that have been stated. 

At present the general tendency of com- 
petitive sports between schools is to select 



Exercise Must be Interesting 127 

a few individuals who because of heredity 
and environment are the least in need of 
physical exercise, train them in order that 
they may become still more proficient, and 
exploit them for the purpose of representing 
the school. For the sake of the school, as 
well as for certain other factors entering 
into the situation, these favoured individuals 
are driven on to win. Athletics of this type 
do not meet my conditions, and their con- 
duct must be profoundly modified before 
they can do so. There is, however, a possi- 
bility of modification in a desirable direc- 
tion. 

If through folk dancing we can devise 
exercises that are interesting to the individual 
girl, exercises that are favourable to good 
circulation, good respiration, good diges- 
tion, good muscular control, grace of move- 
ment — we have accomplished something 
worth while. These two — athletics and 
folk dancing — are the contributions that 



128 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

are now being made to the cause of physical 
education. 

The great educational phase of physical 
training is not to come primarily through 
gymnastics, as we shall see in the chapter 
on "Neuromuscular Coordinations Having 
Educational Value." The ability to use 
joints singly, to segregate those fundamental 
movements which constitute the very basis 
of personality, to separate the physiological 
units into their component parts — this 
ability in itself is evil, not good. 

Athletics must be considered from the 
standpoint of interest and the establishment 
of habit. If the time comes when the larger 
percentage of the graduates from our schools 
and the men and women of our communities 
have secured through any phase of physical 
training the needed physical effects; have 
had established in them habits of enjoyable 
muscular exercise, which if carried on will 
keep them in a constantly healthful condi- 



Exercise Must be Interesting 



129 



tion, and which are feasible under restricted 
conditions — then, it seems to me, we will 
have accomplished that fraction of the 
modification of life's conduct which it should 
be the aim of physical education to effect. 



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VII 

THE PLACE AND LIMITATIONS OF FOLK 

DANCING AS AN AGENCY IN 

PHYSICAL TRAINING* 

A STRANGER, visiting the elementary 
schools of New York City at their 
closing exercises this year (1907), would 
have been impressed by the exhibition of 
the old European folk dances, as given by 
children of the various grades. In a big 
school on the lower East Side might have 
been seen a class of fifth-year girls giving 
the Russian Comarinskaia with such spirit 
as to arouse the enthusiasm of their parents, 
for many of them were Russians and they 
had danced that same dance when they were 

* Address before the Second International Congress of School Hygiene, 
London, August, 1907. At this time the author was Director of Physical 
Training of the Public Schools of New York City. 

130 








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A. DANCES BEING EVOLVED BY CHILDREN TO FIT 
HURDY GURDY MUSIC 

Folk dances demand special music. This is not played by the street hurdy 
gurdies. Thus the children have not danced on the streets the folk dances which 
they have been taught in the New York and certain other public schools. The 
children under these circumstances have in many cases developed steps and in 
some cases dances which fitted the hurdy gurdy music. Illustrations A and B 
show this informal dance development. 

During the winter of 1909-1910 a hurdy gurdy was equipped to play the music 
for the folk dances which the children knew. Illustrations C-G show the recep- 
tion which the public and the children gave to the folk dance hurdy gurdy. 







MM 


.;.r^-. 


1 'A 




CHILDREN DANCING IN STREET. MANY OF 
THESE STEPS OR DANCES ARE ORIGINAL 



As an Agency in Physical Training 131 

younger. In various schools and grades 
were to be seen the Swedish Kloppdans and 
Bleking, the German Hopping Dance, Irish 
Lilt, the Danish Dance of Greeting, and 
so on, each being given, as far as possible, 
in the original form and with the original 
music. 

This wave of interest in the dances that 
have been a race heritage of the peoples 
before they came to New York is not an 
accident, nor has it been brought about 
without deliberation and labour. The situ- 
ation is somewhat as follows : 

The formal gymnastics of the classroom 
needed some elements that should add 
to their interest. While it is true that 
under the leadership of skilful and earnest 
teachers, children are interested in and 
influenced by these formal exercises, it is 
not true that the formal gymnastics in the 
hands of average teachers, who have no 
more than normal interest in the subject. 



132 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

would be done in such a way as to secure 
adequately that good posture which we 
regard as basal, and also that increase in 
the circulation and inspiration which is 
necessary to counteract the effects of long 
sitting still. We needed something that 
would awaken the enthusiasm of both the 
teachers and pupils, so that more life should 
be thrown into the work — so that it should 
be done because it was loved, not because 
it was compulsory. 

During recent years a system of athletic 
sports has been developed which now 
includes the majority of all boys in the 
grammar grades of the public school system. 
This is our system of "class athletics." It 
is a scheme which does not throw the chief 
emphasis upon those who are already 
most expert, by giving them further training, 
but which tries to interest chieJBy those 
of average, or even under the average 
attainment ; a scheme by which the average 



As an Agency in Physical Training 133 

of an entire grade, in running or in jumping, 
is pitted against the average of a like grade 
in another school. It therefore seemed that 
for the boys there were being developed, 
through these athletics, exercises which 
could be maintained to a considerable 
extent in later years. This great interest 
in athletics has had a marked effect in rous- 
ing interest in formal gymnastics. 

But for the girls, we had nothing to 
correspond to these organized athletics. 
We were unwilling to develop athletics 
among the girls on the same basis as that on 
which we were developing them for the boys, 
because we regard the biological history of 
the sexes as sufficiently divergent to make 
it improbable that athletics, which in their 
origin involve movements and instinct feel- 
ings of the combative and hunting type, 
should be adapted to the feminine physiolog- 
ical, psychological, social or aesthetic needs. 
Experimentation with many different forms 



134 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

of exercise — plays, games, and the like — 
gradually developed the conviction that 
among the folk dances were to be found 
some that met, to a large extent, the needed 
conditions. 

It is true that relatively few of these 
dances meet all the necessary criteria. 
Some, for example, require very much 
more space than is available in the limited 
hallways of the average school. The 
majority of our schools do not yet have 
gymnasiums. Then, again, many of the 
dances involve such a slight degree of mus- 
cular effort as to have but little effect upon 
the heart, lungs, or other vital organs of 
the body. From this standpoint, therefore, 
they were ineffective. Still further, in many 
of the dances a large number of the children 
would be standing still most of the time, 
the dancing being done by a small percen- 
tage at any given moment, all taking part, 
but doing so in rotation, each one remaining 



As an Agency in Physical Training 135 

inactive the greater part of the time. Our 
periods of physical training must be uti- 
lized so that each individual is exercising 
most of the time. Then we discovered 
that some of the dances were morally ob- 
jectionable. Some of those which were 
the very best from the standpoint of physi- 
ology (strengthening the muscles of the 
waist and abdomen) were quite impossible 
from this standpoint. The dances must 
also not be too difficult, for they must be 
learned under conditions of brief instruc- 
tion given to the class by the regular 
grade teachers who have first learned them 
from the teachers of physical training that 
supervise the work in going from school 
to school. 

These and other criteria must, of necessity, 
exclude the bulk of the folk dances as 
available material for physical training, 
but there remain a number that do fill the 
necessary conditions. The utility of this 



136 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

group may, perhaps, be classified under 
four major heads: 

Physiological: The dances that have 
been selected involve many contractions 
of the large muscular masses of the body, 
thus having a profound effect upon the 
functions of respiration, circulation and 
nutrition. Because of the interest children 
have in them they are done with a vigour 
which is not given to exercises that are 
less engrossing. Gymnastics may be done 
efficiently and earnestly — even though 
they are uninteresting — by teachers who, 
through constant effort, urge the children 
to do the work; but this is an exhausting 
process to both pupils and instructors. We 
discovered that these large muscular move- 
ments, when done as dances, could be 
carried on two or three times as long 
without producing fatigue, as they could 
be carried on when done as formal gym- 
nastics. This relation of rhythmical exer- 



As an Agency in Physical Training 137 

cise to fatigue seems to us of central im- 
portance. 

Neurological: An analysis of the move- 
ments of which the folk dances of the world 
are built, shows that in the main they form 
an epitome of many of the neuromuscular 
coordinations which have been necessary 
to the life of the race. Upon these basal 
neuromuscular coordinations have been 
embroidered for sesthetic purposes certain 
finer movements. The movements them- 
selves, however — the coordinated move- 
ments of the legs, the swaying of the body 
so that its centre of gravity is in constant 
relation to its point of support, the move- 
ments of the arms as well as those of the 
head — these follow long- inherited tenden- 
cies toward neuromuscular coordinations 
which arose under the selective influences 
of survival. 

Many of the folk dances of the world are 
directly imitative of occupations. There 



138 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

are sowing and reaping dances, dances 
expressing the fundamental activities of 
many of the trades, such as the shoemaker's 
dance. There are dances innumerable 
which illustrate the forms of attack and 
defense, of pursuing and overcoming game. 
It is true that those neuromuscular coordin- 
ations constitute only an exceedingly small 
percentage of all possible coordinations; 
but they constitute those particular coordin- 
ations by means of which man has earned 
his right to live, and in connection with 
which his intelligence as well as his moral- 
ity have arisen. It is not by chance, but by 
necessary associations and the elimination 
of the unfit, that the straightened back, the 
clinched hands, the tightly closed jaws 
have become expressive of anger — coordin- 
ations which the individual acquires and 
uses without instruction. It has not been 
by chance that the moral qualities of pluck 
and courage have been associated with the 



As an Agency in Physical Training 139 

fighting activities, and that they tend to 
be so associated at the present time, during 
childhood at least. The instinct feelings are 
tied up with the neuromuscular system in 
a fundamental way. The dance gives those 
racially old coordinations to the individual. 
Psychological: For this reason these 
neuromuscular coordinations which are 
racially old, fit in most extraordinarily 
with man's expressive life. The body, as 
an agent of will and feeling, does not use 
all possible muscular movements, but only 
those which have during the past expressed 
will and feeling, and which during adult life 
are to be so used. If the folk dances do 
in truth express an epitome of man's neuro- 
muscular history, as distinguished from 
mere permutation of movements, we should 
prefer on these biological grounds the folk- 
dance combinations to those of the unse- 
lected, or even the physiologically selected 
combinations. 



140 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

^Esthetic: It is not the purpose of this 
paper to show — although it may be shown 
without diflSculty — that the history of the 
dance parallels in a remarkable way the 
history of the development of design, and 
in general the history of any of the other 
fine arts. The feeling for beauty, as Ruskin 
has so adequately shown, is vitally connected 
with balance — balance of the body — and 
a sense of support, as in the case of columns. 
The body as aesthetic material is within the 
range of nearly all normal people. Rela- 
tively few individuals can learn to perform 
acceptably on musical instruments, to sing, 
to paint, to draw, or to work in the plastic 
arts; but this sense of beauty in bodily 
movement is sufficiently common to make 
it possible for the great majority of human 
beings to turn to it as a genuine phase of art 
expression. To the mass of people dancing 
has, indeed, been the most available form 
of expression of any of the fine arts. Its 



As an Agency in Physical Training 141 

relation to emotion is also more simple and 
direct than that of any of the other fine arts. 

These are very real and large objects 
in physical training. But what does danc- 
ing fail to do ? It fails in that respect which 
we regard as the first requirement of school 
gymnastics — namely, the correction of that 
faulty posture which is so frequently induced 
by the school desk. It does not tend par- 
ticularly toward the strengthening of the 
muscles of the back which maintain the 
erect posture, nor does it tend particularly 
toward the acquirement of those neuro- 
muscular habits which are basal to good 
posture. It must be evident, then, that 
we recognize folk dancing as a most useful 
adjunct of physical training, not as its 
principal part. 

The dances that we have so far discovered 
to be best suited to our purposes are as 
follows: Third year — Danish Greeting, 
English Harvesters, Vineyard Dance, "Lott 



142 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

ist Todt"; fourth year — Tantoli, Baby- 
Polka, Kull Dance, Negarpolska; fifth 
year — Swedish Kloppdans, Finnish Reel, 
Bleking, Shoemaker's Dance ; sixth year — 
Frykdal Polka, Norwegian Mountain March, 
Highland Schottische, German Hopping 
Dance; seventh year — Swedish Ring, "Hop 
Mor Annika," Irish Lilt, Ace of Diamonds; 
eighth year — Highland Fling, Oxdans. 

In one home I know — a home in which 
no maid is employed — there are three 
girls who have been doing this folk dancing. 
The exercise, as the mother says, has 
brought more happiness into the home than 
anything else during the year. While the 
girls are at their housework they are apt 
to stop for a moment to try one of the new 
steps, one clapping, or possibly all singing 
or whistling the music that belongs with 
the dance. The girls themselves have told 
me that they think about it and dream 
about it; that it made them more joyous 



As an Agency in Physical Training 143 

than anything else has. Certainly, it has 
added greatly to their physical strength and 
endurance, to their grace of movement in 
walking and running. 

The teachers throughout New York City 
are pretty well agreed that formal gym- 
nastics have acquired a new interest since 
these folk dances have been coordinated 
with physical training. Up to the present 
time, this dancing has been conducted in 
classes of the elementary schools during 
after-school hours; and it has been the 
highest privilege in the school to be allowed 
to attend these classes. The dancing has 
thus been a very real means of discipline, 
because only those girls having a high 
mark in scholarship, effort and deportment 
were eligible. So this folk dancing has not 
only been useful from the standpoint of 
physical training, but from the standpoint 
of general school administration as well. 
It has converted one of the least interesting 



144 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

school subjects into one of the most interest- 
ing. It has aroused the enthusiasm of 
teachers and pupils alike. It has added 
real happiness to the lives of a large number 
of what we call our Easl; Side girls, who 
live under conditions of great hardship. 
For these reasons we are developing folk 
dancing as one of the elements of the physi- 
cal-training schedule in the elementary and 
high schools of New York City. 

Gymnastic Dancing. Physical training 
in schools is a vital factor in the promotion 
of dancing in America. Under various 
names, such as fancy steps, gymnastic 
marching, gymnastic dancing, rhythmical 
movements, and the like, dancing is being 
taught by a large fraction of all physical- 
training teachers of America. This is 
being done in classes both for boys and 
girls, in elementary schools, secondary 
schools and colleges, in social settlements. 
Young Men's and Young Women's Chris- 



As an Agency in Physical Training 145 

tian Associations, in business-men's clubs, 
and athletic clubs. In fact, wherever physi- 
cal training is being carried out the 
Folk-dance Movement, as such, is being 
used to some extent, but it does not fit in 
as easily with the programme of the schools 
as do the fancy steps of the gymnastic 
lesson. The fundamental difference 
between the gymnastic dancing as usually 
taught by the physical-training teacher, 
and the folk dancing is that the gymnas- 
tic dances do not pretend to have any 
meaning — they are done for the purpose 
of control of the body, for grace of move- 
ment, for the improvement of posture; 
they are not done as the means of 
expressing the emotions, they are not done 
as social ceremonies nor as the prepara- 
tion for social ceremonies. These gym- 
nastic dances or gymnastic steps are most 
often done as separate movements rather 
than as component parts of a completed 



146 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

artistic whole. This inclusion of gym- 
nastic dancing in the physical-training 
curriculum is of great advantage, both 
from the standpoint of physical training 
and from that of dancing, and is probably 
the most favourable avenue through which 
the folk dances are again to come into 
general use. 




VIII 

ATHLETICS FOR GIRLS — BIOLOGICAL CON- 
SIDERATIONS* 



THE biological differences between men 
and women do not affect to any con- 
siderable extent the purely intellectual part 
of the educational curriculum. These basal 
differences, however, must profoundly 
influence plans for physical training, for 
the success of any educational process 
depends upon the correct interpretation and 
use of the material at hand, in its final mod- 
ification into the desired form. In view of 
the wide competition with men into which 
women are coming in the modern world, 
the question is raised whether it would not 
be wise for them to have the dicipline, moral 

* Adapted from Presidential Address beforeSthe Public School Physical Train- 
ing Society, March 30, igo6. 

147 



148 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

and physical, that is afforded by athletic 
sports. This is undoubtedly true, but only 
to a limited extent. Because, however much 
women may take up the work that is at 
present done chiefly by men, their success 
will not be due to their ability to imitate the 
work and the manner of men. 

During the past ages men have taken 
from women many of the industries that 
were purely feminine in origin — for 
example, the weaving of cloth. But men 
succeeded by applying to their new activi- 
ties their inherent masculine qualities more 
than by assuming feminine traits. To 
adopt the athletic sports, for ages long used 
and developed by men, as the sole or chief 
means of physical training for women would 
be to take a most unscientific short-cut, in 
violation of thoroughly established princi- 
ples of education. In this department the 
principle of recapitulation may be very 
practically applied. 



Athletics for Girls 149 

The differences between men and women 
may be broadly grouped under the captions 
of anatomical structure and instinct feelings. 
The question of causal priority in regard to 
these two factors need not be raised here. 
Evolutionary history indicates pretty clearly, 
however, that both differences in body 
structure and differences in instinct feelings 
are very closely related to the different 
kinds of responsibility that men and women 
have had to carry. The man to be 
depended upon was the one who could fight 
and hunt game; the woman to be depended 
upon was the one who could bear the chil- 
dren, take care of them, superintend the 
agriculture, do the cooking, and attend 
practically to all the daily work. These 
varieties of requirements were powerful 
agencies in sex differentiation. 

The bodily differences are the most 
obvious. Leaving out of consideration the 
broader functional differences, and consider- 



150 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

ing only those that bear on our immediate 
topic, they may be summarized as follows : 

Man's skeleton differs from woman's 
skeleton first in the size of the shoulders; 
these are narrow in the woman and broad in 
the man. The hips are a second point 
of differentiation; they are broad in the 
woman and narrow in the man. The bones 
of the woman are lighter in proportion to 
their size. They are not as heavily marked 
where the muscles are attached to them 
as are the bones of men. The muscles 
themselves are finer in fibre in the woman 
and relatively smaller. As a whole, woman's 
skeleton is shorter and lighter. 

The girl and the woman use less oxygen 
than the corresponding boy and man, and 
less oxygen also in proportion to their own 
weight. For instance, a girl weighing one 
hundred pounds uses less oxygen than does 
a boy of that weight, and, of course, she 
excretes proportionately less carbon dioxid. 



Athletics for Girls 151 

for there must be a balance between oxygen 
and carbon dioxid. It is these structural 
differences that have differentiated the 
activities of men and women. 

Regarding muscular strength, it is rather 
obvious that man excels woman, that the 
average boy is stronger than the average 
girl. That statement is true with the 
exception of a few years at the beginning of 
puberty. As the girl matures earlier, at 
the beginning of puberty she surpasses the 
boy in nearly all respects — in height, 
weight, and speed. That is the time when 
the boy is beaten by the girl at his own best 
games. 

If one were disposed to exploit athletics 
for girls, it might be possible to arrange a big 
meet in which girls competed against boys. 
It could be so managed that although the 
boys' teams would consist of the best athletes 
— selecting boys at the ages of twelve and 
thirteen — that the girls' teams of corres- 



152 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

pondmg ages would do better in practically 
every event. From the showing made one 
might demonstrate the superiority of 
women ! In that way a great foolish occas- 
ion could be made, an occasion that many 
people would take seriously. 

Athletics are pretty largely built up of 
running, striking, and throwing. These 
activities, singly or in combination, make 
up the track and field sports of the world — 
baseball, football, cricket, hockey, shinney, 
lawn tennis, golf, and practically all the 
great forms of athletics. The ability to 
run, to strike, to throw is on the whole a 
masculine ability. That is, during the 
early ages of man's history it was to a very 
considerable extent through his ability to 
run that he could escape from his enemies 
or attack his foes. Consequently, there 
was a persistent tendency for the best 
runners to survive, and for the poorest 
runners to be eliminated. 



Athletics for Girls 153 

The swiftest and longest runners were 
likewise the best equipped for catching 
those animals upon which the food of the 
early men depended. Man did not have 
the thick skin, the powerful jaws or claws, 
the enormous weight, or any of the other 
great weapons of offense or defense pos- 
sessed by the great animals of the later 
Pleistocene era. He had to invent weapons 
outside of his body. He invented two, and 
out of those two simple weapons of savage 
man have come practically all the myriad 
war clubs, catapults, swords, spears, bows 
and arrows, and the like, by means of 
which man did his hunting and fighting 
prior to the age of gunpowder. The two 
weapons that were developed by the early 
men were: the club with which to strike 
near at hand, and the stone with which to 
strike at a distance. 

The early man's ability as a hunter and 
as a fighter depended very largely upon his 



154 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

ability to run, to strike, to throw. The 
man who could take a stone and throw it 
so hard and so straight that it would kill 
or disable his enemy or the animal that he 
needed for food, would be better able to 
defend his family and provide them with 
food than the man possessing this ability in 
a smaller degree. Hence the efficient man 
survived. The same may be said with 
regard to the use of the club. The man 
who could strike the hardest, the most ac- 
curately, would be the more likely to survive 
in those early bitter days of struggle than 
would the man who was less well equipped 
in those directions. 

This process of selection going on for 
many years would produce not merely men 
who possessed greater aptitude in these 
directions, but would also produce a love 
of such exercises. The men who liked to 
throw straight would practise in their leisure 
moments and thus become more proficient 



Athletics for Girls 155 

than those men who merely threw when it 
was necessary. 

The boys would naturally imitate the 
activities of their elders. Therefore, those 
who practised or played with these exercises 
would almost of necessity grow up to be the 
men who excelled in them. By these means 
athletic sports arose. We are the survivors 
of those whose very lives depended upon 
their ability to run, strike, and to throw, 
and whose mental and moral qualities of 
endurance, pluck, team work, fair play, 
and the like were developed in connection 
with the playing and earnest use of those 
activities. 

Thus ingrained deeply in man is the 
love of athletic sports. And the develop- 
ment of boys into manhood seems to be 
related, partly at least, to the moral as well 
as the physical qualities involved in athletics. 
The best qualities of boyhood and manhood 
have thus for long ages been both produced 



156 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

and tested by athletic sports, which may be 
thus considered, to som« extent at least, a 
measure of manhood. 

The case is very different with women. 
It is true there are women whose throw is as 
eflficient as that of men, and there are women 
who have inherited all the other special 
powers in which man is supposed to excel. 
But it remains true that the average woman 
cannot throw as can the average man. She 
cannot throw as the average man can, any 
more than the average man can throw as 
well with his left hand as with his right. 
The average man is handicapped in throw- 
ing with his left arm; just so the woman is 
handicapped in throwing with either arm. 
It does not mean that women cannot learn 
to throw straight and easily, but it does 
mean that her throw has not the forceful 
swing that the boy gets almost without 
training, or with very little training. 

Most forms of athletics are fundamentally 



Athletics for Girls 157 

masculine. The girl in her plays is ripen- 
ing those activities that are fundamentally 
feminine. 

For women were not predominantly the 
hunters and fighters. They cared for the 
home. They carried on the industries. 
They wove the cloth and made the cloth- 
ing, manufactured the baskets, prepared the 
food, tilled the soil, cared for the domestic 
animals, reared the children, and performed 
the other numerous duties that centred about 
the home. There was never a time when 
women had to run, throw or strike as a 
chief measure of their usefulness. It was 
not the women who could run, throw, and 
strike best who survived. The women who 
were the best mothers, who were most true 
to their homes, who were the best workers, 
were those that survived. So athletics have 
never been either a test of or a large factor 
in the survival of women. Athletics do not 
test womanliness as they test manliness. 



158 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

The qualities of womanliness are less related 
to success in athletics than are the qualities 
of manliness. 

A curious illustration of this fact came 
to my attention some years ago. One of 
the small New York City high schools, that 
on Staten Island, held an athletic field day 
for its girls. There were seven events, con- 
ducted under conditions practically identical 
with conditions for similar events that are 
held annually at Vassar College. Those 
high-school girls on their first field day made 
better records in four of the events. So I am 
told, than had ever been made by the stu- 
dents at Vassar College ! The reason is that 
progress in growth toward womanhood does 
not mean progress toward increased eflS.- 
ciency to do athletic sports. It is not at all 
an uncommon occurrence for a team of 
girls of about twelve years to defeat a basket- 
ball team of young women of college age. 
The little girls are more athletic. Their 



Athletics for Girls 159 

bodies have not yet differentiated into the 
form of the adult woman. The adult 
woman's body is less adapted for athletic 
sports than is that of the girl. 

We will assume without discussion that 
education does have considerable effect 
upon the persons educated. If we should 
allow a girl to pursue only masculine activi- 
ties straight along, these would tend to push 
her in a masculine direction. We believe 
that the training of girls in womanly ways 
does tend to develop them in womanliness. 
To force either boys or girls to the exclusive 
use, or the predominant use, of plays and 
games which have chiefly been related to 
the other sex, would be a fundamental error. 
I do not mean that in mature life there are 
any admirable qualities of mind or character 
possessed by woman that man should not 
acquire, or that there are any such char- 
acteristics possessed by man that woman 
should not strive after; but during the years 



160 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

when character is being formed, it must 
be shaped according to the fundamental 
characteristics of each sex. We do not 
want womanish men nor mannish women. 
Each sex must first be fundamentally true 
to its own kind. The essential need for 
the girl is not to be brave and loyal to the 
crowd. It is required of her first that she 
be loyal to the home. We first ask of the 
boy that he shall be loyal to the crowd, 
straight and true. That is the evolutional 
stage. 

With these considerations in mind we 
may formulate certain preliminary con- 
ditions to the solution of our educational 
problem. The aptitudes that, present in 
the boy, create athletic sports which involve 
the old, racially necessary movements of 
running, striking, and throwing are absent 
in the girl. Consequently it is false reason- 
ing to assume that in order to develop the 
bodies of girls to a corresponding degree 



Athletics for Girls 161 

of excellence with those of healthy boys, we 
must use the same mieans. It is undoubt- 
edly true that women must learn group 
loyalty and cooperation, and that these 
requirements are as important in our present 
social life as the physical well-being and 
strength of women. But women must 
learn these lessons in their own ways. A 
considerable number of girls and women 
profit greatly by athletic sports, but it is 
certain that for the great majority of girls 
athletic sports do not have the compelling 
interest that they have for boys. Therefore 
sports cannot be counted upon as educa- 
tional factors in the development of women 
to the same extent as for men. 

So far as the subject has been experi- 
mented with, dancing seems to be the form 
of exercise best adapted to the abilities and 
needs of girls, and bids fair to take the 
place in the average girl's education that 
athletics take in the life of the average boy. 



162 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Dancing is here used in the large, old 
sense — the sense in which it was used 
among the ancient Greeks. The two-step 
and the waltz do not constitute any large 
part of the dancing curriculum. 




IX 



NEUROMUSCULAR COORDINATIONS HAVING 
EDUCATIONAL VALUE* 

THIS paper does not treat of the entire 
subject of muscular exercise. It 
aims only at one of the specific objects of 
exercise. In order to define the subject it 
may be well to state the four headings under 
which we are accustomed to classify the 
major objects for which muscular exercise 
is taken, namely: 

1. Exercise for therapeutic purposes. 
Under this heading come orthopaedic exer- 
cises, exercises to develop cardiac power, 
the reeducation and development of a 
paralyzed member or of a tabetic, etc. 

2. Exercise for organic or hygienic pur- 

* Reprinted from the New York Medical Journal for October 17, 1908, 
163 



164 The Healthful Art of D mcing 

poses, the general purpose being to increase 
the general functions of the body, such as 
circulation, respiration, digestion. This is 
ordinarily spoken of as " general exercise." 

3. General neuromuscular education. 
This consists of the bringing to complete 
function those general neuromuscular coor- 
dinations that are desirable for the indi- 
vidual to possess. 

5. Special neuromuscular education, 
which may be needed for some specific 
activity or occupation, such as playing the 
piano, typewriting, playing billiards, hand- 
writing. 

This classification does not include those 
forms of exercise that are taken incidentally 
in the earning of one's daily bread or in the 
pursuit of happiness. 

This paper relates, then, exclusively to the 
third heading, namely, general neuromus- 
cular education. It aims specifically to 
answer the following question: Are there 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 165 

any neuromuscular coordinations which 
exceed in value from the pedagogical stand- 
point any other coordinations ? Or, to state 
the question in a different way, have neuro- 
muscular coordinations an equal value from 
the educational standpoint? If they have 
not equal value, which coordinations are 
the most important, and what are the 
criteria by which we can select the coordina- 
tions that are the most important? 

I am not referring to that training by 
which the individual is equipped for specific 
acts that may be necessary during later 
life, such as playing the violin, writing, using 
tools, or any specific acts whatever. I am 
referring to a general basis of education. 

It is only in recent years that students 
have given us the neurological data which 
support the findings of experience in our 
answer to this question. One of the best 
studies is the brilliant one of Hughlings 
Jackson, with his three-level theory of 



166 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

epilepsy in its relation to cord and brain. 
Frederick Burke, in his notable study enti- 
tled "From Fundamental to Accessory in 
the Development of the Nervous System and 
of Movements," formulated and defended 
with brilliancy one of the essential theses, 
namely, that in the development of the 
human being the different parts of the ner- 
vous system come to function in a more or 
less definite sequence, those of a more 
fundamental character antedating those of a 
more accessory character. We must not 
forget the brilliant work of Clouston on the 
Neuroses of Development. 

Before attempting to answer the question 
it may be advantageous to illustrate in a 
concrete way the nature of the problems 
involved. 

It is conceivable that an individual might 
be trained to operate the muscles which 
control the eyes independently. Would 
such specialized discipline be of advantage 



eUromuscular Coordinations 167 

or disadvantage to the individual? It is 
possible, by some means of suitably prepared 
gymnastic exercises, to train the individual 
so that he can coordinate movements which 
to the untrained are entirely impossible, 
for example, to move the arms in opposite 
circles. I may move my right arm at the 
shoulder joint, involving, of course, scapula 
movements through various right-angled 
positions. It is an exceedingly simple 
matter to have the left arm do these move- 
ments at the same time and in the same way 
as they are done by the right arm. It is 
possible to train the individual so that the 
identical movement shall be involved, but 
one arm with a movement behind the other, 
the completed series being finished by the 
leading arm one count or one movement 
ahead. The children's trick of patting the 
abdomen and rubbing the top of the head, 
and then attempting to change the move- 
ments of each hand suddenly, so that the 



168 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

hand that was patting commences to rub and 
the hand that was rubbing begins to pat, 
illustrates another exceedingly simple coor- 
dination which it is diflBcult for the person 
who has not learned it to accomplish. 

Some years ago a large volume was writ- 
ten, describing a new system of gymnastics 
by De Laspe, the fundamental assumption 
of which was that it was simpler to move 
one joint than to move two. Therefore, 
every child should be trained to use each 
joint of the body in all ways possible. He 
should then begin to use each joint of the 
body in all possible combinations with every 
other single joint of the body. After these 
two-joint coordinations in all possible re- 
lations had been accomplished, he should 
then proceed to train hi-s neuromuscular 
apparatus so that three joints might be 
used at once in all possible relations to 
each other. This process was to be kept 
up until the individual could do anything 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 169 

with his body of which it was capable. A 
few illustrations are given at the back part 
of the large work, showing the kind of move- 
ment that would be involved by the pure 
chance combinations or permutations of 
movements involved in seventeen joints 
at once. They remind one slightly of an 
individual during an epileptic seizure, that 
is, the movements were absolutely unrelated 
to each other. 

In the light of this book, I would restate 
the question as follows: Are there any 
neuromuscular coordinations which tend 
more strongly than do any other neuro- 
muscular coordinations toward a whole- 
some development not only of body control, 
but of the central organ of body control — 
the nervous system ? Are there movements 
that serve better than others to bring about 
that growth of tangential fibres which 
Flechsig has shown to be related to intelli- 
gence, and to that relation of dendrite to 



170 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

axon and synopses that promote or afford 
the basis for wholesome living? 

An analysis of the muscular movements 
made by a child immediately after birth 
indicates definite and useful coordinations 
already functioning with a considerable 
degree of perfection. Breathing is suddenly 
established. This in itself is an exceedingly 
complex act, involving constant readjust- 
ment with the different positions of the body, 
the relations of the spine to the ribs, and the 
ribs to the abdominal wall, which vary with 
the changes in abdominal pressure which 
are due to gravity. Breathing in the 
horizontal, prone position is not an identi- 
cal act with breathing in the vertical posi- 
tion. In any position it is a most highly 
complex series, of acts. We find this neuro- 
muscular mechanism ready to use upon the 
birth of the child. 

The hand, actuated as it is by forty 
muscles, moving twenty-seven joints, func- 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 171 

tions vigorously as a whole; and since 
Robinson called our attention to the fact, 
I presume that all of us have demonstrated 
for ourselves the high degree of grasping 
ability that is present in the hand of the 
new-born child. Sucking and swallowing 
are acts involving coordinations of muscular 
groups that are not closely related ana- 
tomically. 

The child lies on his back and kicks, 
breathes and cries. All of this means that 
there are thousands of neuromuscular coor- 
dinations all ready to use. The coor- 
dinations involving the use of the eyes are 
not perfect at birth, but it takes a relatively 
small degree of practice — I do not, of 
course, refer to conscious practice — to 
develop that control which results in the 
coordinated action of the eyes. Eye move- 
ments as related to neck movements are 
quickly acquired. The muscles controlling 
individual vertebrae are never isolated so 



172 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

as to be actuated by the individual, but they 
can be used serially, as shown by many 
individuals who have acquired the power 
to bend in any part of the spine without 
bending any other part, or to bend with a 
wave-like motion, the centre of motion 
extending from one end of the spine to the 
other. 

Standing erect involves most delicate and 
constant adjustment of nearly all the muscles 
of the legs, trunk, and neck. While in 
this position, the movement of one arm for- 
ward makes it necessary for the individual 
to readjust his balance, thereby compelling 
readjustment of tension from all the groups 
of muscles involved. In running, jumping, 
throwing, striking, and in all of the large 
body activities, practically all the muscles 
function. They function rather auto- 
matically, not as automatically as does the 
heart nor as automatically as the process of 
breathing, but they function automatically 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 173 

in the sense that the individual does not 
think of the muscle, of the part to be used 
but thinks of the object to be accomplished. 
It is a physiological unit which is working. 
An examination of the great variety of 
neuromuscular coordinations that children 
learn in their ordinary, unguided daily 
play indicates that the fundamental fact 
with reference to the progressive coordina- 
tion of these successive sets of movements is 
physiological and not anatomical. The 
body is serving its function with reference 
to accomplishing given results. This is 
done by throwing into action successively 
coordinations which are more or less auto- 
matic. Those acts which are " ready to 
use," that are done at birth, are performed 
without anything more than the preliminary 
movements made by the child during gesta- 
tion. They require, some of them, no 
practice; others, very little. The older 
the child becomes, the more complete the 



174 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

repertoire of coordinations becomes, the 
less are the coordinations ready to use, and 
hence the more is practice necessary. If 
we view the body as a functional unit it 
simplifies the case. 

That study of anatomy which consists of 
merely a knowledge of the different systems 
is superficial and unreal as compared with 
that knowledge of anatomy which sees 
muscles, ligaments, and bones as having 
been developed by having to do specific 
acts. The act is the fundamental thing 
which determines the structure rather than 
the reverse. It is because the hand had to 
bring the object to the mouth of the individ- 
ual, for example, that we may account for 
the insertion of the biceps on the radius 
rather than on the ulna. Insertion on the 
ulna would have given the biceps a far 
greater power as a flexor of the forearm, 
but one of the particular acts for which the 
biceps is adapted and which, perhaps, we 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 175 

may assume was one of the acts which helped 
to produce it, was that act by which the 
individual reached for an object with the 
hand prone and grasped it, then bringing it 
to the mouth, supinated the hand, in order 
that the palm might bring its contents to 
the mouth. So the biceps was attached in 
such a way as to flex the forearm upon the 
upper arm, at the same time that it was 
acting as a supinator. 

This illustration of the priority of use is 
one that might be carried over into the 
neurological field. 

Let us turn now from muscular acts for 
physical ends to those muscular coordina- 
tions which are done for psychic purposes 
— the expression of anger, fear, hope, and 
so on. These demand complexity of coor- 
dination following and flowing into each 
other, never being twice exactly alike, for 
the conditions which arouse the emotions 
vary, and the expressive acts of the emotion 



176 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

itself vary correspondingly. A set of such 
incomprehensibly complex series of coor- 
dinations as is involved in the muscles 
of the face, of the throat, of the hands, 
of the back, demands the genius of art 
to portray — coordinations involving not 
merely the neuromuscular, but the neuro- 
glandular system, involving the intestinal 
tract, as Mosso has shown, the bladder, and 
probably all the organs of the body. The 
whole body expresses the emotion — it is a 
unitary physiological act, rather than one 
which is built up by the laborious construc- 
tion of adding one joint movement to 
another. 

Most of the activities of modern life are 
built of those neuromuscular coordinations 
which have in former times been useful to 
the race, that is, by great biological units. 
Even in such technical accomplishments 
as playing the piano or the violin, using the 
typewriter, riding a bicycle, and using the 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 177 

scalpel, we are using racially old movements 
almost entirely. That which is purely 
new constitutes but an incidental part, 
although, of course, a necessary part of the 
total act. Even here the combination is one 
of physiological units or wholes, rather than 
of individual muscles or individual joints; 
that is, it is a physiological association as 
contrasted with an anatomical association 
of muscular activities. 

Turning now to the functioning of the 
body with reference to psychic states, the feel- 
ings which actuate us to-day differ in their 
objects to some extent from those which 
actuated us during the prehistoric days of 
man's life; but we cannot conceive of the 
fundamental psychic or emotional states 
as having changed. The study of the stock 
market is a new thing to think about or to 
feel about, but it is with the same old emo- 
tions of love, hate, fear, ambition, desire, 
in wonderfully complex ways, that we get 



178 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

the modern phenomenon; that is, here 
again we are using certain fundamental, 
unitary acts as contrasted with incidental 
or isolated mental faculties. The emotions 
themselves are fundamentally old, even 
though their application be to new things. 

The way in which these emotions take 
their form in the body is also unchanged, 
and is the same among all the peoples of 
all the earth. We speak of thinking and 
willing, old complex acts — remaining 
essentially the same, even though we apply 
them to new things. Thinking, in so far as 
it is motor, is associated with the rehearsal 
of the muscular acts thought of. These 
are at bottom racially old neuromuscular 
coordinations. For example, even in such a 
complex matter as viewing a landscape we 
form our judgment of distance by eye 
movements. 

I might go on and show how the recon- 
struction of our conception of the education 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 179 

of the body, from one of associating ana- 
tomical groups to viewing it as a physiolog- 
ical whole, is at present reconstructing psy- 
chology. It is but recently that we have 
ceased to hear of a faculty of attention, a 
faculty of memory, of will, and the like; 
whereas we now know that there are as 
many different kinds of attention as there 
are different kinds of things to give atten- 
tion to, and that there are as many different 
kinds of memory as there are different kinds 
of things to remember. With this crumb- 
ling of the faculty psychology there has 
fallen that theory of education which has 
aimed to train each faculty by itself and 
then adjust it to the other faculties. This 
is precisely the fate of that conception of 
physical education which aimed to train 
each muscle or joint and then coordinate it 
with the others. 

Thus we find a violent contrast between 
that which is logical and that which is 



180 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

pedagogical. It is logical to build up mus- 
cular movements, but we find it to be against 
the whole tendency of children. We find 
that normal children learn the successive 
acts involved in plays and games with ease, 
that feeble-minded children may be meas- 
ured in their feeble-mindedness pretty 
accurately by the extent to which they have 
learned those neuromuscular coordinations 
that have been common to our kind. We 
cannot think of man becoming funda- 
mentally different with reference to the 
relation of structure and function from 
what he is now. He will continue to live 
a life of love, of hope, of fear, of desire, 
as he is living now; and he will express 
these old emotions in ways which are intel- 
ligible now. Therefore, for the child to 
learn his plays and games, his running, 
jumping, striking — all that play which 
involves skill of hand, coordination of eye 
and hand — is fundamental with reference 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 181 

to his psychic activity, for he functions as 
a whole. It may be true that the time will 
come when man may no longer need to 
run or even to walk, but we cannot conceive 
of a time coming when the adult man will 
not need to have learned to walk when he 
was at the proper age, because of the bear- 
ings of this upon his neuromuscular system. 
His failing to learn to walk might be to his 
nervous development, somewhat as the cut- 
ting off of a tadpole's tail is to its subse- 
quent development, or better, the omission 
of the gillslits in the human embryo. 
Adult man has no use for gillslits, but if the 
gillslits were lacking in the embryo, the 
blood circulation in man could not have 
developed in its present form. 

Thus we see that not merely general 
neuromuscular coordinations should be 
taught to children, but specific ones, highly 
complex ones, racially old ones. To do the 
opposite tends toward the breaking down 



182 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

of the structure that has been built up 
through all the ages. To train the eyes to 
move independently would be to move 
away from sanity and wholesomeness. It 
would tend to break up that coordination of 
impressions and the unity of that act which 
we regard as visual thinking. 

These coordinations are historically old. 
They are the kind of movements that have 
meant success. They are the kind of move- 
ments because of which our forefathers sur- 
vived. The man who could run and jump 
and throw was better fitted to survive than 
the man who could not do these things with 
an equal degree of skill. Upon this basis 
the whole emotional and intellectual life is 
built. This accounts to some extent for 
the fact that the kinds of coordinations of 
which I have spoken — athletic sports, 
plays and games — are interesting to chil- 
dren as formal gymnastics are not inter- 
esting. 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 183 

Thus, true physical education is not to 
be accomplished by the teaching of segre- 
gated muscular movements, but by the 
orderly development of increasingly com- 
plex movements which are racially old, 
which involve good posture of the body, 
which train the individual to express pre- 
dominantly emotions consistent with modern 
life. These movements are to be expressed 
in terms of physiological acts to be accom- 
plished, certain wholes, rather than as 
anatomical parts to be moved. 

I have tried to show: 

1. The unitary character of our neuro- 
muscular as well as other acts; 

2. That they exist in racially old com- 
binations ; 

3. That we inherit these coordinations, 
or at least a strong tendency toward them; 

4. That mental, moral, ethical, social 
life is built on them. 



184 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

We should therefore in our physical 
instruction educate: 

1. In physiological units; 

2. Toward racially old and inherited 
tendencies. 

This paper is already so long that I can 
but suggest what should be discussed under 
the general heading of the nature of the 
curriculum through which the child should 
be led. 

This consists first of the unguided plays 
of babyhood. During this period no instruc- 
tion is necessary. Opportunity for free 
activity, rolling, kicking, and the like, is 
enough. The impulse within the child 
will lead him to perfect such mechanisms 
as are then developing. Following these 
come the games and sports of childhood. 
Here the child needs help. In old com- 
munities, suitable games are passed on from 
generation to generation of child-life without 



Neuromuscular Coordinations 185 

adult aid; but in a country like ours, 
particularly in our great cities, made up 
largely of peoples from different countries, 
different villages, these play traditions are 
lost. They need to be restored to children 
by skilful teaching; not by formal instruc- 
tion, but by that informal leadership which 
the well-equipped adult can give. 

The old rhythmical movements which 
have been found among all the primitive 
peoples and in all civilizations have crystal- 
lized in the dance. These folk dances 
express in extraordinarily complete form 
man's history — the sowing of grain in the 
spring, the reaping in the fall, the chase. 
In fact, all of man's life has been portrayed 
and crystallized in these art forms, which we 
in America have allowed to die. They must 
be resurrected and given again to the chil- 
dren as part of their birthright, as a funda- 
mental part of their education — not merely 
muscular education, but emotional educa- 



186 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

tion — for in these great plays and games 
of the world it is the whole individual that 
is called into activity. In this fact lies 
their extraordinary interest and value. 

It is true that because of the school desk 
with its deforming tendencies we need to 
have special exercises that shall tend to 
overcome these deforming effects ; but aside 
from this, the general curriculum of neuro- 
muscular activities involved in physical 
education should be that based upon the 
physiological unit type found in these plays, 
dances, and games. 




THE RETURN OF THE DANCE 

THE search for traditional dances of 
European peoples is a curiously disap- 
pointing one. Cities and villages on the 
well-established lines of travel sometimes 
indeed have these dances, but in these 
cases they are preserved mainly for exhibi- 
tion to the traveller for financial con- 
siderations. For example — the Tyrolean 
dances sometimes seen in the Bois du 
Bologne restaurant in Paris: they were 
entertainments for the foreigner rather than 
the play of the people. It is not merely 
that these social occasions are protected 
from public view, but that the dances 
themselves have long since been dropped 
and forgotten. When one leaves the beaten 

187 



188 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

track and pursues his search in communities 
where the traveller is wellnigh unknown, 
the search is almost as hopeless. The 
advertisement of a Kermess in a little, 
out-of-the-way village in Germany was 
promising, but in actual fact it was nothing 
but an all-day dance-hall waltz with heavy 
beer-drinking accompaniment. The old 
quaint costumes peculiar to the locality 
would have been as out of place as in any 
other ballroom. The old dances were 
gone — completely gone. Their memory 
even excited neither pride nor enthusiasm. 
The former customs, costumes and dances 
were generally regarded as old-fashioned, 
queer and provincial. The wealthier classes 
have long been making a strenuous en- 
deavour to have the peasants in the vicinity 
of Marburg, Germany, continue the use 
of their picturesque costume. The peas- 
ants themselves, however, object; and in 
spite of the fact that there are various 



The Return of the Dance 189 

inducements, financial and otherwise, 
offered to those who wear the old forms of 
dress, these unique and picturesque gar- 
ments are rapidly disappearing from use. 
This is a general state of affairs and is not 
limited to one section or country. 

Friends have said that the endeavour in 
which we are engaged to preserve those 
of the folk dances which are beautiful 
and wholesome, was so thoroughly against 
all these signs of the times that it was use- 
less and futile. A more extended study 
of the situation indicates that the case is 
not a discouraging one — that our endeavour 
is but a part of a world-wide movement 
in intelligent and artistic circles — that it 
fits in with both a need and a demand — 
and that its success is inevitable. The 
reasons which have led to this conclu- 
sion are as follows: 

Most children in their teens pass through 
a period which we call the "awkward age." 



190 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Boys, particularly, discover that they have 
hands and feet, discover in a new sense 
that these are not merely convenient 
appendages vrith vrhich to handle things 
or to move oneself about with. The boy 
sitting *'in company" will place his feet 
forward and then backward, will cross 
his knees, uncross them, will put his hands 
in his pockets and then pull them out, 
will have one hand in front and the other 
behind, then have both in front and 
both behind. This awkwardness and con- 
scious endeavour to adjust and readjust 
so as to do a thing in proper form, applies 
not merely to the hands and feet. This 
is merely the most visible form in which 
the awkwardness and self-consciousness 
show themselves. The feelings themselves 
reach out more or less consciously to include 
mental activities, the expression of feel- 
ing, affection, dislike, pride, self-assertion. 
During this stage there is usually a con- 



The Return of the Dance 191 

scions endeavour not to betray one's feel- 
ings. During childhood we expect children 
to act spontaneously and naturally, and 
during adult life, when it is well bred and 
well balanced, we also expect spontaneity 
and naturalness, but the spontaneity of 
adult life is usually attained through the 
deliberate and conscious choice of that 
which is in accordance with good social 
custom. 

During the "awkward age" the indi- 
vidual is extraordinarily sensitive to those 
things which are queer and different. 
A boy who is still kept in short trousers 
when the rest of his playmates are in long 
trousers, suffers torment which is altogether 
in excess of any reasonable importance 
which may attach to this difference. It 
is of little account to the boy that his 
mother and father and sisters and aunts all 
say that he is not of the right age yet to have 
long trousers. If the rest of the boys have 



192 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

long trousers it makes him feel queer and 
different not to have them. The real 
world in which he lives is the world of 
*'Boydom" — the public opinion which 
affects him most strongly is the public 
opinion of his crowd. The "consciousness 
of kind" is gripping him more firmly than 
it has ever gripped him before and is 
making him conform to the standards of 
his own world. This is one of the most 
cohesive social forces of the world. It is 
a force to which we are all susceptible. 
To wear a hat that is distinctively out of 
style, which is two or three years out of 
date as compared with the hats which our 
fripnds are wearing, annoys any of us. 
A coat may be in good condition, com- 
fortable and suitable, but if it is 
markedly different in form and colour 
to the coats which the friends in our 
world are wearing, it hurts us to wear 
it. If in our world the men wear their 



The Return of the Dance 193 

hair short and parted, it takes a man of 
extraordinary difference to wear his hair 
long and braided. 

As the child goes through the "awkward 
age," and comes out into adult life, he 
feels another and almost equally powerful 
force gripping him, and that is the forc^. 
which makes him want to emphasize his 
own individuality, the fact that he is a 
separate person, that he is not a mere 
duplicate of the rest, that he is a special 
and particular person. This is the feeling 
which makes us all feel strangely and per- 
haps offended when we meet some one 
else who has purchased a suit exactly like 
ours. I am told that a woman rarely feels 
complimented at meeting another woman 
who has a hat or a suit exactly the same 
in goods and pattern as her own. By 
means of a little different cut, a different 
use of ornament on a person, a different 
combination of goods and in a hundred 



194 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

other ways, we seek more or less uncon- 
sciously to assert our separateness. 

There is a delicate balance then between 
these two forces. We are unwilling to be 
so different as to be queer and we are 
unwilling to be so like as to be common. 
We wish to observe all those special per- 
sonal habits which distinguish us from the 
rest, provided they are not so different that 
people class us among the freaks. 

This, which is so true and obvious with 
reference to the individual, is in certain 
ways as true with reference to communities. 
The whole civilized world is now going 
through a stage which is curiously like 
the "awkward age" of the adolescent 
child. Japanese men have wellnigh for- 
saken those interesting forms of hair dress- 
ing which have been characteristic of 
Japanese manhood for hundreds of years. 
They are endeavouring, more or less uncon- 
sciously, to express their citizenship in 





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The Return of the Dance 195 

the world. Local costumes, belonging to 
small communities or other special groups 
of people, are rapidly being dropped in 
favour of those costumes which are more 
generally used. Communities are afraid 
of being queer, of being provincial, of 
not belonging to the great world. They 
drop their local ceremonies which have 
for hundreds of years been carried on in 
connection with birth, marriage, death, 
the advent of spring, the gathering in of 
the crops, the coming of the May. The 
traveller sees less and less of that which 
is picturesque and different. 

If there were nothing, but this to say 
on this subject it would be hopeless and 
discouraging, but we have already entered 
upon the stage in the community life cor- 
responding to the adult desire to be different 
as well as to be like, and all over the civilized 
world there are intelligent groups of people, 
led by those of artistic insight, who see the 



196 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

meaning- of these old folk customs and 
ceremonies and who are deliberately asso- 
ciating themselves together to preserve 
these art forms in ways which may fit into 
modern life. In Skansen, Sweden, for 
example, the government is oflScially pre- 
serving and propagating the old folk 
customs, games and dances. Folk-lore 
societies everywhere are preserving the 
arts of the past for the use of the future; 
and our own endeavour in New York City 
to select from folk dances of the world 
those which fit modern occasions, and teach 
them to oncoming generations, has already 
met with brilliant and extended success. 
Thus these two deep desires, one for 
the expression of individual life, and the 
other for the expression of community life, 
is coming to consciousness. The funda- 
mental need of human nature for aesthetic 
self-expression, and of the community for 
aesthetic forms in which to express various 




Courtesy of Mis. ^rz.^nam j /,.,.,..,,,//, [,_, _4xcl EUassons Konstforlag 

TYPICAL SCENE IN SWEDISH HOUSEHOLD 



The Return of the Dance 197 

community functions, are just as real as 
they ever were. 

Stated in other words, the general reason 
why these folk arts have been passing 
seems to be that a critical attitude has been 
developed by the general spread of reading, 
education and travel, and that this critical 
attitude has produced self-consciousness. 
Folk art is naive, and naivete disappears 
in the presence of self-consciousness. Self- 
consciousness drove out these arts; now 
our conscious need of them is leading us 
to their restoration on a new level. Already 
even in our elementary schools various 
forms of art are recognized as essential 
parts of the educational programme. 

The restoration of art as a common 
property is coming again, but now in forms 
consciously selected and pursued. The 
dance is the form of art which is most 
possible for the average person. A genera- 
tion or two will again see it in its proper 



198 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

place in human life, adapted and developed 
with conscious reference to present-day 
social conditions. It also seems that 
ensemble singing, like dancing, will come 
again into popular life through conscious 
development in the schools. 

The conscious restoration of such festi- 
vals as that of May Day, and the creation 
of suitable forms in which to express the 
spirit of liberty on the Fourth, are examples 
of how the community need for aesthetic 
expression is finding itself. 

There is also a strong tendency in the 
social world to emphasize all those expres- 
sions of the emotions which are carried 
on by ineans of words, and to restrain the 
bodily expression of the feelings, to restrict 
gesture, to keep the face more or less immo- 
bile. This is not less true of the community 
than it is of the individual. This accounts 
partly for the decay in the celebration of 
festivals, pageants and community-feeling 



The Return of the Dance 



199 



ceremonies. This is just as true of the 
community as it is of the individual. So 
here again we are feehng the necessity and 
seeing the rise of a great wave which is 
restoring to us, both as individuals and as 
communities, those forms of feeling expres- 
sion which are exemplified by festivals, 
by dancing and the like. Words are only 
indirect means for the expression of one's 
self. These other forms of art are far more 
adequate, satisfying and educational. 

We thus see why these art forms have 
died down together, and how and why 
they are coming back in new and better 
form of development. 




Division III 
PHILOSOPHY 



XI 

FOLK DANCING AS AN ART 

THE development of folk dancing as an 
art form may be easily paralleled 
with the development of design, although 
in describing the development /of design 
we have available a far larger amount of 
historic material from which to construct 
the story than has been found concerning 
the folk dance. Of course, design — like 
every other art form — has arisen in various 
ways. The following, however, appears 
to be one of the most definitely established 
origins. 

When in moments of leisure the early 
man began to decorate his baskets and 
pottery with figures illustrating events of 
the chase or the fight, he had presented to 

203 



204 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

him a problem very different from that 
which existed when he had the wide expanse 
of the cliff or cave upon which to portray 
his figures: the space available for the 
design on the basket or pottery was limited 
and definite. Accordingly, in decorating 
his vessels there gradually arose the use 
of symbolic figures standing for certain 
events or even series of events. This 
compression of the story into a definite 
space was a means of converting every 
such representation into an art product 
having symbolic form. 

It is believed that many of the folk dances 
originated in a similar way. The sowing 
of the grain in the spring, the reaping of 
the harvest in the fall, the pursuit of the 
enemy, the successful hunt — in fact, all 
of the chief events of human experience 
were rehearsed not only in words; the 
tale was accompanied by gestures and body 
expression. 



Folk Dancing as an Art 205 

The necessity of compressing events cov- 
ering long periods of time into the short 
periods available for story-telling did for 
the narrative dances exactly what the 
space limitation did for design ; it compelled 
the use of symbolic gestures embodying 
groups of activities. These stories, told 
both by word of mouth and by body move- 
ment, were repeated by the common people 
through the countless ages of man's early 
history, until they gradually developed 
coherency and uniformity, each one of its 
own kind. In every case — as is also 
true of folk music — the most effective 
form of presentation survived. A folk 
dance represents, then, the long history of 
human activity embodied in a specific art 
form. In the development of the dance the 
compressing element was the time, rather 
than the space, available. 

In the museum at Oxford, England, is 
a collection of vases dug up in the island 



206 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

of Cyprus. The earliest of these vases 
are simply crude bottles or jugs about 
which strings had been arranged to serve 
as handles. The strings had gradually 
made marks upon the outsides of the bottles. 
Eventually the bottles were supplied with 
other handles, and the strings were no 
longer used. Then the owners painted 
on the bottles lines over the places where 
the strings had made marks. The painting 
of lines on the bottles became a decoration. 
Then, instead of having the lines running 
uniformly, some thoughtful person made 
another arrangement of them, one that he 
liked better. This process continued until 
the arrangement of lines — which first fol- 
lowed the strings — had lost all resemblance 
to the original string markings. Thus 
there were gradually developed pure designs, 
related solely to the size and shape of the 
bottle. From the last of the vases in the 
series it would never be guessed that the 



Folk Dancing as an Art 207 

design painted upon it was built upon the 
strings by means of which the bottle was 
originally carried. 

In some of the old houses in Germany 
I found the structural timbers standing 
out and showing through the plaster. The 
house frame had been built, fastened solid, 
and then plastered, the plastering being 
applied between the timbers. Of course, 
the timbers were not all straight; some 
were oblique, to keep the house from 
twisting. After a time many of the timbers 
were covered up, until finally all of them 
were hidden by plaster. Then imitation 
timbers were painted on the plastering 
for purposes of decoration. Now there 
existed no structural limitation as to where 
the lines should be painted; hence timbers 
were portrayed wherever it was thought 
that they showed to best advantage. In 
time people began to make crude symmet- 
rical patterns out of the lines imitating 



208 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

timbers. The process developed until the 
design was approximately pure, having 
absolutely no relation to the lines of force 
or stress and strain to which a building is 
subjected. Here, again, pure design grew 
out of the imitation of a structural element. 
In music we have the symbolic use of 
tone as expressed in Wagner's leitmotifs 
where certain phrases always stand for 
certain ideas. In singing we have a whole 
range of evolution from the purely imitative 
to the pure art form. When we hear some- 
one singing a beautiful composition, if we 
are listening to it from the standpoint of 
art, it makes little difference to us whether 
we understand the words or not. If we 
are listening to it so as to understand the 
intellectual content, then we want to know 
the words that are being sung. The song 
may be in a tongue that we do not under- 
stand, but we may understand the language 
of aesthetics in which also it speaks to us. 



Folk Dancing as an Art 209 

Language itself has passed through and 
is passing through a similar development. 
We must imagine that speech at first con- 
sisted partly at least of imitated sounds. 
We still have such words as "splash," 
"kiss," and "thump," which are of this 
character. They are words which by their 
very sound imitate that of which they are 
descriptive. Language has also other kinds 
of content. Children are always pleased 
when first they find that words can rhyme 
and that phrases can have rhythm. This 
other content of language develops until 
we have the forms of poetry. Poetry is 
that form of language in which we like 
to hear the most beautiful sentiments 
expressed. It is the adequate, the only ade- 
quate language, for saying certain great 
things. It is acquired, an art form embody- 
ing imitation, symbolism. It is not yet pure, 
and probably never will be pure, because 
of the necessary presence of the meaning. 



210 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Just so the dance has been gradually 
constructed out of the muscular movements 
that man found it necessary to use in his 
daily occupations. Those exercises, prop- 
erly arranged, produced rhythmical move- 
ments that are capable of expressing and 
arousing some of man's deepest and strong- 
est feelings. Dancing is at first imitation; 
then it becomes symbolism; that is followed 
by the interpretation of emotional states; 
and finally the dance may become pure. 

What is it that has happened in these 
and in other forms of art development? 
The essential thing has been selected and 
put in the foreground. It has been properly 
supported and displayed in its true relations. 
Consequently we see the final portrayal 
of the vital in art, and in art alone. True 
art brings out the truth that underlies the 
real. Art is then not the imitation of 
nature. It is the selection of the ideal 



Folk Dancing as an Art 211 

that underlies the mass. Art means a 
stripping of the mass of that which is acci- 
dental, purposeless, of that which merely 
happened to be there and which obscured 
the central thing, and exhibiting the cen- 
tral thing, free from imperfections. 

Thus dancing takes the drudgery of 
life and portrays it in its ideal, in its signifi- 
cant form of beauty. Art makes the ideal 
out of the real. The absolute real is not 
the most valuable part of life, because 
the real is necessarily covered with all 
manner of daily incidents — with dust. 
Its valuable parts need to be arranged, 
as all of life needs to be arranged in order 
that it may approximate the ideal. Art 
makes poetry out of the prose of life. Art 
makes dancing out of drudgery. In this 
general sense art is the pursuit of the ideal. 

Man, I think, differs more from the 
animals by his relation to art — in other 
words, by his pursuit of the ideal — than 



212 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

in any other way. That person is least 
human who has become "disillusioned," 
who no longer sees the essential meaning 
of things, who only recognizes the crass, 
material "real." It is the same difference 
as exists between a person who sees the 
picture in a landscape and the person who 
sees merely the material things constitu- 
ting the landscape — the earth and the 
trees and the grass. 

Life in its deeper meaning does not 
consist merely of the real. It consists in 
the pursuit of that which is more true than 
the real, which underlies the real — in 
the pursuit of that seen by seers, prophets, 
artists. To strive for that means a most 
passionate and vital reality. This pursuit 
of the ideal is more fundamental than 
the pursuit of food, of clothing, of shelter. 
You remember the little girl that Jacob 
Riis tells about. She was seriously under- 
nourished, she was cold because of insuffi- 



Folk Dancing as an Art 213 

cient clothing; but when a good woman 
came to the child and said, "What can I 
get for you?" she answered, "Oh, if I 
could but have a pair of red shoes!" The 
child was essentially right in her choice. 
She was pursuing the ideal, that which 
possessed for her beauty and significance. 
Many people live happily with but little 
clothing, inadequate food, with insufficient 
shelter: they possess the primary thing in 
life — some great ideals for which they 
live. I have no idea of undervaluing food 
and clothing and shelter; these things are 
necessary, but the pursuit of them is less 
distinctly human than is the pursuit of 
ideals. 

The danger here in America — because 
of the youth of our country and because 
of the extremely rapid pace at which we 
have been compelled to widen our material 
responsibilities through the development 
of machinery — is the overvaluation of 



£14 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

material achievement. Hence there has 
arisen danger that our ideals become merged 
into that materialism which shuts out the 
significance of life. There is now going 
on a great revolt against materialism, and 
the folk-dancing movement is part of that 
reaction. Folk dancing means the pursuit 
of that thing which is ideal — the joy of 
living — that which is more real than the 
drudgery of everyday life, that which makes 
human life interesting and significant, 




XII 

ELEMENTS OF THE DANCE 

SOME years ago I remember visiting 
an art museum and seeing there a 
picture of a hen and chickens. While I 
was looking at the picture, I heard a very 
wise young person comment upon it from 
the standpoint of its truthfulness to nature. 
That person had evidently cared for chickens 
and knew from personal observation the 
exact feather markings that should be upon 
the kind of hen represented by the artist. 
He was able to criticize the picture with 
considerable learning from the standpoint 
of its pure likeness to nature. His con- 
ception of art evidently was that its funda- 
mental element consists in the faithfulness 
with which a picture represents nature. 

215 



216 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

He did not know that the beauty and the 
purpose of that picture lay in the relations of 
its masses of colour, in the relation of light 
and shade, the relation of the parts of the 
picture to each other. He did not under- 
stand that the artist used the hen and 
chickens as a medium — not as an end. 
He might have criticized the picture from 
the standpoint of the texture of the paint 
almost as fairly as he criticized it with 
reference to its microscopic correspondence 
to nature. The artist of the painting had 
taken a thing from everyday life and used 
it as a medium for the expression of ideas. 

Imitation. The peoples of the world 
have taken their weddings, births and 
deaths, spring and harvest, plowing and 
reaping and sowing, the treading of the 
grapes and the threshing of the grain, 
the making of shoes, the trades, all of 
human activities — the common content of 
life — and have told the story in art form. 







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Elements of the Dance 217 

They have expressed these things in body 
rhythms, with balance, proportion, and 
unity. These are the dances of imitation. 

The predominant effect of the imitative 
dance is one of grotesqueness. These 
dances are largely restricted to the move- 
ments involved in the occupations imitated. 
The dancer is not free to move his body as 
he pleases, being bound by the movements 
used in the activity out of which the dance 
is built, just as the artist who painted the 
hen and chickens is limited to a large 
extent by the necessity of making his picture 
really represent hen and chickens, as well 
as accomplishing the other, the artistic 
object. 

The imitative dances are conveniently 
placed first, for they are closest to nature 
and are the lowest, rather than the highest 
art form. They seem to be one of the first 
steps that the savage takes away from 
the attitude of regarding life as something 



218 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

merely to be lived, and toward the treating 
of it as something to be expressed by art — 
something to be arranged, in order to bring 
out the deeper meaning. 

Symbolism. There is in dancing a second 
element which also conveys definite mean- 
ing but expresses it in a way quite different 
from that already mentioned. It does not 
consist of the imitation of any specific act, 
such as sowing or reaping; nor does it 
express in universal terms a fundamental 
emotion, such as joy, sadness, or triumph. 
It nevertheless expresses definite ideas or 
emotions. The effect is accomplished 
through the use of symbols. The language 
of symbols is a definite one. It is not 
instinctive as is the expression of the 
emotions by the face or body, but like any 
spoken language, is understood only by 
those who have learned it. 

We Anglo Saxons use the language of 
symbols in muscular movement less than 



Elements of the Dance 219 

do the Southern peoples. The Spanish, 
for example, will indicate a negative by 
holding the hand forward with the palm 
out and moving the index finger sideways 
in the vertical position. That movement 
expresses to them a negative as clearly as 
does the sideward shake of the head to us. 
Similarly, they have a forward and back- 
ward movement of the hand with the fingers 
at right angles to tke arm, which is the 
symbol for ** good-bye.'* A plain gold 
band on the third finger is a symbol, though 
not one of movement, which is generally 
understood by our people. The custom 
that men have of removing the hat is a 
symbol of reverence, of courtesy. Our 
flag is a symbol of the country for which 
it stands. It is not a picture of the country, 
nor does it specifically represent any of 
the emotions; and yet, a long-absent 
traveller seeing again the flag on his native 
shores will be affected not merely by the 



220 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

intellectual group of associations connected 
with his country, but by certain emotions 
as well. 

This language of symbols is elaborately 
used in some of the dances. For example, 
the symbol for "night" with one people 
is that of placing the hands upon the eyes, 
having the elbows akimbo. For "dawn" 
the hands are partially raised from the eyes. 

There is no sharp line of separation 
between gesture and symbolic movement; 
they shade into each other. So we usually 
see the imitative dances, i. e., those express- 
ing the activities of sowing and reaping, 
the treading out of the grapes, or whatever 
the activity may be that is represented, 
containing movements that are symbolic. 

A symbolic movement is one which often 
originally contained in itself a meaning, 
but which has lost that original meaning 
as such and remains merely a symbol for 
it. For instance, originally the savage 




Photograph by Paul Berger 

ISADORA DUNCAN 

INTERPRETER OF THE FEELING OF CLASSIC TIMES 

BY MEANS OF THE DANCE 



Elements of the Dance 221 

made a rude sketch of a cow. He gradually 
abbreviated the picture, until he had merely 
the three-cornered drawing, showing 
roughly the shape of the head with two 
horns. To one who had no knowledge 
that the three-sided figure with the two 
prongs came from the picture of a cow, 
it would be meaningless. The figure has 
developed from the picture of a cow into 
a symbol of a cow. 

Emotional interpretation. The imitative 
dance relates to activities and ideas; the 
symbolic dance is more abstractly related, 
but still it concerns itself more with ideas 
than with feelings; the interpretative dance 
is more purely related to emotional states. 
As we see Isadora Duncan dancing the 
Seventh Symphony, we do not perceive 
that she is imitating any human activities 
whatever. In some of her dances for a 
moment she brings in imitation, when, for 
instance, she plays with knuckle bones; 



222 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

but she uses, on the whole, few symbolic 
movements. Her movements are predom- 
inantly old, instinctive movements of the 
body, particularly of the face, expressive 
of emotional states. I have never seen 
any one who governed the muscles of her 
face more perfectly, making them express 
as she pleased the emotions to be described 
or interpreted. And she uses not only 
her face, but her entire body — the neck, 
the shoulders, the back, arms, wrists, thighs, 
ankles, and feet, making each contribute 
its share in the perfect whole. In the grave 
movements and postures of a Greek funeral 
dance one sees dignity, reverence, mystery, 
and sorrow eloquently portrayed. 

Pure art. Then finally we have the 
dances, or elements of the dance, that are 
not imitative, that do not employ symbols, 
that do not use the muscles of the body 
in ways racially old and instinctive. These 
are the dances that involve successive posi- 



Elements of the Dance 223 

tions and movements of the body beautiful 
in themselves. In these forms the suc- 
cession of movements is no less definite 
than is the succession of the chords in fine 
harmony, or the succession of tones in 
splendid harmony. Here we have the pure 
art of dancing, which means nothing 
in terms of ideas, which means nothing in 
terms of common emotion, but which is 
fundamentally related to beauty itself. The 
end is accomplished by the use of many 
of the laws that govern good modelling. 
The lines made by the body and the limbs 
must be such as would be beautiful in a 
statue; the positions must change into 
each other by movements which in them- 
selves form curves and lines of grace and 
beauty. The theme or motif of the dance 
must be introduced, developed, and com- 
pleted under such laws as govern poetry. 
The rhythms and accents must fall as 
definitely as they do in music. Thus the 



2M The Healthful Art of Dancing 

dance presents many of the same problems 
that are before the composer, the poet, the 
sculptor. 

Relatively few dances possess all of these 
characteristics. The Irish jig, for example, 
appeals predominantly to certain rather 
unrefined and marked rhythms. It is " pure 
art," but not art of a high order, and 
corresponds rather closely to the complex 
rhythmical drumming that Wallascheck 
describes as found among primitive Aus- 
tralians. 

The "pure art" dances are thus more 
modern than are those previously described. 
This group is further removed from nature, 
in the sense that the best of art is nature 
arranged. It is the most abstract group 
and is made by bringing out the various 
elements of beauty most purely and treating 
them individually. The most formal exam- 
ple of this type of dance is the ballet. It 
is not imitative, is not symbolic, it is not 



Elements of the Dance 225 

interpretative; it expresses beauty alone. 
Much of our best music is of this character. 
It does not imitate the sounds of nature, 
uses no symbols, nor does it primarily 
interpret an emotional state. 

Under these four rubrics: imitation, 
symbolism, emotional interpretation, and 
pure art, it is believed that the major 
elements of the dance may be included. 
The dances themselves may be to a limited 
extent classified under these rubrics. That 
is, there are dances which are predomi- 
nantly imitative in their nature, as the 
Swedish Shoemakers' Dance and dances 
which imitate the sowing of the grain by 
the hand. Other dances are predominantly 
interpretative of the emotions. Many of 
the dances performed by Isadora Duncan 
are of the latter type. Finally there are 
dances that are primarily based on the joy 
of movement, expressing itself in pure art 
form, the positions, attitudes and movements 



226 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

assumed being such as to satisfy the canons 
of good art with reference to line, the 
elements of proportion, unity, and rhythm. 

But more frequently we find that the 
dances consist of mixed elements : imitation 
and symbolism follow each other in such 
swift succession that the dance itself cannot 
be classified as belonging under either group. 
Emotional interpretation is also constantly 
discovered, even in dances that appear to be 
most purely imitative. 

Then, again, there are dances which seem 
to be predominantly related to the beauty 
of the movements and the positions taken 
but which have running through them 
phrases expressive of definite emotion, ideas, 
or even imitation of common acts. 




XIII 

RHYTHM 

A MOST all the sounds of nature that 
come to our ear are heard by us in 
pulsations, that is, rhythmically. Even the 
chirping of insects comes to us in pulses, 
in rhythms. The blowing of the wind 
through the trees is not a steady sound; 
it comes in periods of alternating power 
and cessation, and is distinctly rhythmical. 
The sound of falling water is rhythmical. 
The tones and the number of pulsations per 
minute of the waters of Niagara have been 
written. The babbling of a brook to a 
person who has trained himself to listen 
can be expressed in musical tones. The 
wind blowing over a field of grass does not 
simply bend the blades. It sways the field 

227 



228 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

in waves, and the waves are approximately 
equidistant from each other; they are 
rhythmical. Waves of a certain size are a 
certain distance from each other. The 
pounding of waves on a beach is in con- 
stantly recurring rhythms, and much of the 
fascination that lies in those sounds is 
traceable to the series of pulses in which the 
sounds come. 

Rhythm underlies art. Its presence is 
most readily perceived in music. There 
we find a certain number of counts to a 
measure, a certain number of measures to a 
phrase. The music of all savage peoples 
is fundamentally rhythmical. The most 
common form of music is that produced by 
pounding; hence the drum is one of the 
most universal musical instruments. Cer- 
tain Central African tribes carry on by 
means of the drum complicated rhythms 
which altogether surpass in complexity any 
rhythms of civilization. I am not referring 



Rhythm 229 

to that use of tone which has been intro- 
duced in the kettledrum and which has 
come into vogue since the Wagnerian time. 
The Central African people tell a story, more 
or less completely, by the beats of the drum. 
The story will be told in the varying rhythms 
of the drumming. To say things over and 
over in a rhythmical way appeals both to 
savages and to children; and in compli- 
cated ways it appeals to adults. 

In decoration pure rhythm is the earliest 
form. One of the primary modes of decora- 
tion was the tattooing of the body in 
rhythmical designs. 

Growth is rhythmical. We do not grow 
steadily, day by day. We grow in alter- 
nating periods of rest and work, and these 
periods form the great daily, monthly, and 
annual rhythms. There is a diurnal rhythm 
in the rate of the heart, in the depth of 
respiration, in the temperature of the body. 

The planets move in orbits of mutual 



230 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

rhythms. Their distances, one from the 
other, can be expressed in relational mathe- 
matical terms. The storied "music of the 
spheres" would be music as truly as any 
other had we organs capable of recording 
these rhythmical pulsations. 

Getting closer to life, let us trace how this 
set of rhythms — the rhythm of the move- 
ments of the sun alternating with the move- 
ments of the moon — causes the inner 
rhythms. The diurnal rhythm of alternat- 
ing darkness and light corresponds with the 
diurnal ebb and flood of life's forces. We 
feel different at night from what we feel 
during the day. We feel different in the 
fall from what we feel in the spring. We 
are better and more active at some times of 
the year than at others. The differences 
are not attributable merely to the direct 
effects of light and darkness. They are 
due to the flow of the vital forces within us. 

It is significant — far more than a set 



Rhythm 231 

of coincidences — that the first stage of life 
occurs, not only in the case of human beings 
but also in the case of most of the higher 
animals, in periods related to the course of 
the moon. Women have this monthly 
rhythm developed in them to a marked 
degree. I am not referring particularly to 
the menstrual period, but to a certain pulse 
of acuteness of vision, acuteness of hearing, 
ability to touch most delicately experienced 
at that period which is the time of highest 
power. At the upstroke of life there is 
greater muscular strength, greater power 
to apply the mind, and the feelings are 
stronger than at the opposite end of the 
curve, when there is greater liability to 
depression and discouragement. Far more 
of the suicides of women occur at the ebb 
of the monthly rhythm than at flood. 
That which we are accustomed to call the 
monthly periodicity of women is merely 
one phase of an exceedingly large biological 



232 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

phenomenon of which that is merely an 
incidental evidence, and not the most 
important. 

The whole of human life rests upon rhyth- 
mical ebb and flow. Evolutionists agree 
that the most favourable place for the 
development of that form of life out of 
which human kind originated is the sea- 
shore — not inland nor in the deep sea, 
but where the water comes and goes over 
the surface of the land. There would be 
found the best food supply and the condi- 
tions for the development of early forms 
of life would there be most favourable. 
At the seashore, it is now generally believed, 
the lowest forms of animal life on this 
planet had their origin. 

The tides are all related to the moon. 
During certain parts of the month they are 
higher and at other times lower. At certain 
times of the year they are higher than at 
others. The food supply of all tidal animals 



Rhythm ' 233 

— that is those living in that territory which 
is alternately covered and uncovered by sea 
water, depends upon the size of the tides. 
Evolutionists say that growth is coincident 
with the amplitude, or the reverse, of the 
food supply. That is, it depends upon tidal 
movements. Either the animal will grow 
most when the biggest tide is on, or grow 
most at the time of the lowest tide. In 
either case the rhythm of the tidal movement 
will be impressed profoundly upon the 
fundamental structure of animals living 
under this influence. When the periods of 
growth do not correspond with the periods 
of the moon and the tides, the animal dies. 
For example, let us imagine that eggs 
are laid on a beach or in the water. Those 
that are laid so as to hatch during a favour- 
able time will come to life and survive in 
greater proportion than will those laid to 
hatch at a less propitious time. Thus 
through survival there is established a 



234 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

rhythm of reproduction corresponding to 
the tides. Owing to the influence of the 
ebb and flow of the tides, and thus of 
the food supply, the earliest forms of animal 
life had stamped into their very being this 
growth by pulses which corresponds to the 
tides and thus to the lunar months. When 
the single-celled animals became more 
highly developed they retained the diurnal 
and lunar monthly rhythms. These higher 
forms are the ancestors of the cells out of 
which the human body is built. Thus at 
the very start of life we are rhythmical in our 
life habits. 

The hatching of many birds' eggs is in 
periods of weeks. For the duck it is four 
weeks and for the chicken three. The 
time that mammals carry their young is often 
expressible in terms of lunar months. 
For human kind it is nine months, and the 
number diminishes as we go down the scale 
of animal life. The length of time of gesta- 



Rhythm 235 

tion is related to tidal movements. So 
the whole basis of the ebb and flow of life is 
a rhythmical one, related to the movements 
of the tides. It is no wonder, then, that we 
love that which is rhythmical. 

Rhythm forms the basis of all art — music 
poetry, sculpture, painting, architecture. 
And rhythm has not been merely at the 
foundation; it has extended straight 
up into the superstructure. Take, for 
example, the highest form of activity, that 
connected with religion. It is there that 
we have the most rhythmical music. In 
the decorations found on the walls of fine 
churches and cathedrals the element of 
rhythm is distinctly expressed. There is 
the rhythmical walking of the processional, 
which is probably directly descendent from 
the old Greek dances. There is the use of 
rhythm and harmony of colour even in the 
clothing of those who are vested. Vitality 
expresses itself in a multitude of rhythmical 



236 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

ways. In the pursuit of most of the higher, 
the most beautiful, the most enjoyable 
things, man employs rhythm as a funda- 
mental element. 

Let us turn now to an example of the 
effects of rhythm upon human beings. 
Some years ago it was my good fortune to 
make a journey through the black belt of 
Alabama, where I observed the revival 
phenomena as shown in a series of meetings 
held in churches for coloured people. 
Owing to the kindness of a prominent 
church oflBcial, I was enabled to come into 
confidential relations with many pastors, 
and to meet and make medical examina- 
tions of some of those who had been most 
profoundly affected by the revivals. I 
examined a number of persons immediately 
after what is called "the visitation of the 
Holy Spirit" had taken place. 

By means of a simple system of musical 
shorthand, I was able to record the various 



Rhythm 237 

rhythms used by the preachers, and to com- 
pare their effectiveness. Sitting back of the 
audience, usually in the gallery, my pres- 
ence wholly unknown to the worshippers, 
it was possible for me to make unusually 
full observations. I saw the quiet audience 
under the stimulus of the constantly reiter- 
ated rhythms of the speaker's voice, now 
in speech, now in music, frequently accom- 
panied by effective gesticulations, gradually 
beginning to nod or to tap gently with the 
feet on the floor. That movement was 
followed by slight swayings of the body, 
occurring so regularly as to give an impres- 
sion not unlike that given by a field of wheat 
over which a soft breeze is blowing. The 
gentle hum of the accented voices, com- 
bined with the rhythms presented to eye 
and ear, had evidently a constantly accentu- 
ating effect. 

The bodily movements became larger 
and more emphatic, the voices became 



238 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

stronger, and the rhythm was more positive. 
Occasionally individuals would rise from 
their seats, and with perfect rhythm of step, 
accompanied by lateral swinging of the 
body and singing, walk up and down the 
aisles. The general position of the audi- 
ence was one of intense and absorbing 
attention ; the bodies were inclined forward 
and the heads were erect. 

Presently moans would be heard and a 
manifest thrill would go through the 
audience. Usually a young woman — or 
occasionally a man — would spring into the 
air with a wild shriek. The control of 
these people was so utterly at ebb that even 
the body balance was lost. They would 
make tremendous jumping movements 
involving the trunk, legs, and arms, accom- 
panied by screams and cries of the most 
extraordinary intensity uttered in a very 
high pitch. I observed particularly one 
woman who weighed, I should say, about 



Rhythm 239 

two hundred pounds. She Jumped straight 
into the air and then fell backward into 
the pew behind her, where the combined 
strength of four men was not sufficient to 
prevent her making these violent move- 
ments of the body. The exertion was 
followed by all the phenomena of exhaus- 
tion: relaxed muscles, shallow breathing, 
and dilated pupils. 

This set of experiences, which cannot 
here be cited in detail, must serve as an 
illustration of the place that rhythmical 
movements have in arousing and expressing 
emotion among practically all the peoples 
of the earth. The war dances of the 
Indians; the occupation dances of very 
many savage peoples; the love dances, 
especially of the Orient — all tell a story of 
awakening and expressing various emotions 
by means of rhythmical body movements. 



APPENDIX 



APPENDIX 

PLAYGROUND ASSOCIATION OF AMERICA 

Tentative Report of the Committee on Folk 
Dancing For 1908-09* 

1. The first object of your Committee on Folk 
Dancing has been to determine those folk dances 
and folk singing-games that are most useful under 
the conditions found in American playgrounds. 

A. We have considered three kinds of playgrounds 
found in this country : 

1. Country places, or large outdoor, grass- 
covered spaces. 

* It is to be noted that the Committee on Folk Dancing has presented a report, 
not upon the social use of the folk dance, but upon the use of folk dancing where 
active exercise, large numbers of children and limited space are involved. Thus 
the lists of dances that are presented by this committee are designed to meet 
this particular need. This does not mean that there are not many other folk 
dances which are entirely suitable for social objects. For example, the Virginia 
Reel, which is referred to definitely as not being included in this list because it 
does not contain enough vigorous exercise, may be of great value from a social 
standpoint. 

Attention was called to this matter in the conference on the report of the 
Committee at the Third Annual Congress, and instructions were issued that this 
explanation be added to the report. 

LuTHEE H. GuLiCK, President. 

243 



244 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

2. Ordinary playgrounds with dirt surfaces. 

3. Indoor playgrounds with board, cement, or 
asphalt floors. 

B. We have also considered the kinds of people 

who use these playgrounds: 

1. Small children (boys and girls, mixed). 

2. Larger boys, in separate groups. 

3. Larger girls, in separate groups. 

4. Grown men and women. 

C. We have also considered these folk dances 

and games for their value to those for whom 
" they are intended, and not from the stand- 
point of the spectator, eliminating the element 
of personal display and choosing those in 
which large numbers can take part, and 
which have, in addition to a social element, 
the virtues of (1) simplicity, (2) vigorous 
action, (3) wholesome, natural, out-of-door 
spirit. 

We have, therefore, compiled a list of folk dances 
which have been found successful and well loved, 
and have classified them as to their suitability for 
use in these different kinds of playgrounds and as 
to their suitability for use by small children, boys, 
girls, and adults. 



Appendix 245 

2. Our second object has been to prepare a list 
of dances, which are of special significance and can 
be fitted into special occasions, such as festivals of 
the seasons, greeting, farewell, rejoicing, celebration 
of holidays, etc. 

3. Our third object has been to make as com- 
plete as possible a list of printed matter relative to 
folk dancing, with printed outline of the character 
and special value of each, specifying each of the 
dances on our list as described therein. 

Out of a list of seventy-nine folk dances compiled 
by your Committee, we have chosen those which 
were known and especially approved of by at least 
two of the committee. 

We herewith submit: 

First. A selected list of folk dances, followed by 
various classifications of these dances accord- 
ing to their suitability under different 
conditions. 

Second. A list of dances representing various 
occupations. 

Third. A list of dances suitable for special 
occasions. 

Fourth. A list of printed matter relative to 
folk dancing. 



246 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

SELECTED LIST OF FOLK DANCES 

Arranged alphabetically according to nationalities 
of dances, with name of dance and name of book 
where description or music, or both, may be found : * 

Bohemian Dance . Komarno 
9. "Folk Dance Music." 
10, "Folk Dances." 
Bohemian Dance . Strasak 
9. "Folk Dance Music." 
10. "Folk Dances." 

Danish Dance . Ace of Diamonds 

24. "Old Danish Folk Dances." 
Danish Dance . . Dance of Greeting 

29. "Popular Folk Games and Dances." 
Danish Dance . . Shoemaker's Dance 

24. "Old Danish Folk Dances." 

English Dance . . Bean Setting (Morris Dance) 

21. "The Morris Book." 
English Dance . . How Do You Do, Sir ? (Morris 
Dance) 
21. " The Morris Book." 
English Dance . . Laudnum Bunches (Morris 
Dance) 

21. "The Morris Book." 



* The number prefixed to the name of the book corresponds in each case to 
that prefixed to the title of book in the list of books of folk dances. 



Appendix 247 

English Dance . . Maypole Dance 

14. " Guild of Play Book of Festival and 
Dance." 

Finnish Dance . . Bounding Heart 
11. "Folk Dances and Games." 
Finnish Dance . . Harvest Dance 

11. "Folk Dances and Games." 

Hungarian Dance . Csardas 
10. " Folk Dances." 

Irish Dance. . . Jig 

9. "Folk Dance Music." 
10. "Folk Dances." 

Italian Dance . . Tarantella 
9. "Folk Dance Music." 
10. " Folk Dances." 

Norwegian Dance . Mountain March 
24. "Old Danish Folk Dances." 

Russian Dance . Comarinskaia 

12. " Folk Dances for Men." 
9. "Folk Dance Music." 

10. "Folk Dances." 



248 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Scotch Dance . Highland Fling 

10. "Folk Dances." 
Scotch Dance . . Highland Reel 

10. "Folk Dances." 

Scotch Dance . . Highland Schottische 

11. "Folk Dances and Games." 



Swedish Dance . Bleking 

28. "Old Swedish Folk Dances." 
Swedish Dance . Clap Dance 

28. "Old Swedish Folk Dances." 

33. "Swedish Recreative Exercises for Schools 
and Playgrounds." 
Swedish Dance . Fjalnas Polska 

32. "Swedish Folk Dances." 
Swedish Dance . Oxdans 

28. "Old Swedish Folk Dances." 
Swedish Dance . Reap the Flax 

33. "Swedish Recreative Exercises for Schools 
and Playgrounds." 

Swedish Dance . . Trollen 

8. "The Folk Dance Book." 
Swedish Dance . Varsouvienne 

28. " Old Swedish Folk Dances." 
Swedish Song Play . Carousel 

31. "Song Plays." 



Appendix 249 

Swedish Song Play . Hey, Little Lassie 

15. "Gymnastic Dancing." 
Swedish Song Play . How Do You Do, My 
Partner ? 

29. "Popular Folk Games and Dances." 
Swedish Song Play . I See You 

3L "Song Plays." 
Swedish Song Play . KuU Dance 

10. " Folk Dances." 
Swedish Song Play . Ma's Little Pigs 

10. " Folk Dances." 
Swedish Song Play . Nigare Polska 

33. "Swedish Recreative Exercises for Schools 
and Playgrounds." 
Swedish Song Play . Peter Magnus 

31. "Song Plays." 
Swedish Song Play . Ritsh, Ratsh 

31. "Song Plays." 
Swedish Song Play . To-day is the First of May 

31. "Song Plays." 

ADDITIONAL DANCES 
NOT FOLK DANCES, BUT FOUND DESIRABLE 

Chorus Jig ... Mr. M. B. Gilbert, 
Boston, Mass. 
Not published . 



250 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Christmas Dance . Mrs. M. H. Woolnoth, 
London, England. 
14. " Guild of Play Book of Festival and Dance." 
Jumping Jack . . Mr. Hebbart, Providence, R.I. 

12. " Folk Dances for Men." 
Lilt . . . . . Dr. W. G. Anderson, 

Yale University, New 
Haven, Conn. 
12. "Folk Dances for Men." 
Spring Flower Dance . Mrs. M. H. Woolnoth, 
London, England. 
14. " Guild of Play Book of Festival and Dance." 
Ugly Mug ... Mr. M. B. Gilbert, 
Boston, Mass. 
Not published. 

DANCES SUITABLE FOR GRASS PLAYGROUNDS 



Name of Dance 


Nationality oj 


f Dance 


Ace of Diamonds . 


Danish 




Bean Setting . . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Bleking . . . . 


Swedish 




Carousel . . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Clap Dance . . 


Swedish 




Dance of Greeting . 


Danish 




Fjalnas Polska 


Swedish 




Harvest Dance . 


Finnish 





Appendix 



251 



Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Hey, Little Lassie . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


How Do You Do, 






My Partner ? 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


How Do You Do, 






Sir? . . . . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


I See You . . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Kull Dance . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Laudnum Bunches . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Ma's Little Pigs . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Maypole Dance 


English 




Mountain March . 


Norwegian 




Nigare Polska . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Oxdans .... 


Swedish 




Peter Magnus . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Reap the Flax . 


Swedish 




Ritsh, Ratsh . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Shoemaker's Dance 


Danish 




Tarantella . . . 


Italian 




To-day is the First 






of May . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 



DANCES SUITABLE FOR PLAYGROUNDS WITH DIRT 
SURFACE 



Name of Dance 
Ace of Diamonds 
Bean Setting 



Nationality of Dance 
Danish 
English (Morris Dance) 



252 The Healthful Art of Dancing 



Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Bleking .... 


Swedish 




Bounding Heart 


Finnish 




Clap Dance 


Swedish 




Fjalnas Polska 


Swedish 




Hey, Little Lassie . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


How Do You Do, 






My Partner ? 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


How Do You Do, 






Sir? . . . . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Kull Dance . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Laudnum Bunches . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Ma's Little Pigs . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Maypole Dance 


English 




Nigare Polska . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Oxdans .... 


Swedish 




Peter Magnus . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Reap the Flax . . 


Swedish 




Shoemaker's Dance 


Danish 




To-day is the First 






of May . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


TroUen .... 


Swedish 




DANCES SUITABLE 


FOR INDOOR PLAYGROUNDS 


Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Ace of Diamonds . 


Danish 




Bean Setting . . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 



Appendix 



253 



Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Bleking .... 


Swedish 




Bounding Heart . 


Finnish 




Carousel . . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Clap Dance . . 


Swedish 




Comarinskaia . . 


Russian 




Csardas . . . 


Hungarian 




Dance of Greeting . 


Danish 




Fjalnas Polska 


Swedish 




Harvest Dance . . 


Finnish 




Hey, Little Lassie . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Highland Fling 


Scotch 




Highland Reel 


Scotch 




Highland Schot- 






tische .... 


Scotch 




How Do You Do, 






My Partner? 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


How Do You Do, 






Sir? ... . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


I See You . . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Jig 


Irish 




Komarno . . . 


Bohemian 




KuU Dance . . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Laudnum Bunches. 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Ma's Little Pigs . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Mountain March . 


Norwegian 




Nigare Polska . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Oxdans .... 


Swedish 





254 The Healthful Art of Dancing 



Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 3 


Peter Magnus . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Reap the Flax . . 


Swedish 


V 


Ritsh, Ratsh . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Shoemaker's Dance 


Danish 




Strasak .... 


Bohemian 


(Song Play) 


Tarantella . 


Italian 




To-day is the First 






of May 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Trollen .... 


Swedish 




Varsouvienne . 


Swedish 




DANCES SUITABLE FOR SMALL CHILDREN 


Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 1 


Ace of Diamonds . 


Danish 




Bleking .... 


Swedish 




Bounding Heart . 


Finnish 




Carousel . . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Clap Dance . . 


Swedish 




Csardas .... 


Hungarian 




Dance of Greeting . 


Danish 




Fjalnas Polska 


Swedish 




Hey, Little Lassie . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


How Do You Do, 






My Partner? 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


I See You . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Komarno . . . 


Bohemian 





Appendix 



255 



Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


KuU Dance . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Ma's Little Pigs . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Maypole Dance 


English 




Mountain March . 


Norwegian 




Nigare Polska . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Oxdans .... 


Swedish 




Peter Magnus . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Reap the Flax . 


Swedish 




Ritsh, Ratsh . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Shoemaker's Dance 


Danish 




Strasak .... 


Bohemian 


(Song Play) 


To-day is the First 






of May 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Trollen .... 


Swedish 




Varsouvienne . . 


Swedish 




DANCES SUITABLE FOR LARGER BOYS 


Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Bean Setting 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Bleking .... 


Swedish 




Comarinskaia 


Russian 




How Do You Do, 






Sir? .... 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Jig 


Irish 




Jumping Jack . . 


Irish 




Komarno . 


Bohemian 





25Q The Healthful Art of Dancing 

I Name of Dance 

Laudnum Bunches 
Lilt .... 
Oxdans . . . 



Nationality of Dance 

English (Morris Dance) 

Irish 

Swedish 



Reel Scotch 



DANCES SUITABLE FOR LARGER GIRLS 



Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Ace of Diamonds . 


Danish 




Bean Setting 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Bleking .... 


Swedish 




Carousel . . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Clap Dance . . 


Swedish 




Comarinskaia . 


Russian 




Csardas .... 


Hungarian 




Fjalnas Polska 


Swedish 




Harvest Dance . . 


Finnish 




Highland Fling . . 


Scotch 




Highland Reel . . 


Scotch 




Highland Schot- 






tische .... 


Scotch 




How Do You Do, 






My Partner? . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


How' Do You Do, 






Sir? . . . . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


I See You . . . 


Swedish 


Song Play) 


Jig 


Irish 





Appendix 



257 



Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Komarno 


. Bohemian 




Kull Dance 


. Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Laudnum Bunches 


. English 


(Morris Dance) 


Maypole Dance 


. English 




Mountain March 


. Norwegian 




Nigare Polska . 


. Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Peter Magnus . 


. Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Reap the Flax . 


. Swedish 




Shoemaker's Dance 


; Danish 




Strasak . . . 


Bohemian 


(Song Play) 


Tarantella . . 


. Italian 




To-day is the :First 




of May . . 


. Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Trollen . . 


Swedish 




Varsouvienne . 


Swedish 




DANCES E 


SUITABLE FOR 


ADULTS 


Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Ace of Diamonds 


Danish 




Bean Setting (men) 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Bleking . . . 


Swedish 




Bounding Heart 


Finnish 




Clap Dance 


Swedish 




Comarinskaia . 


Russian 




Csardas . 


Hungarian 




Fjalnas Polska 


Swedish 





258 The Healthful Art of Dancing 



Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Harvest Dance . 


Finnish 




Highland Fling 


Scotch 




Highland Reel 


Scotch 




Highland Schot- 






tische .... 


Scotch 




How Do You Do, 






Sir? (men) . . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Jig 


Irish 




Komarno ... 


Bohemian 




Kull Dance . . 


Swedish 


(Song Play) 


Laudnum Bunches 






(men) . . . 


English 


(Morris Dance) 


Maypole Dance 


English 




Mountain March . 


Norwegian 




Oxdans (men) . 


Swedish 




Strasak .... 


Bohemian 


(Song Play) 


Tarantella . . . 


Italian 




Varsouvienne . 


Swedish 




DANCES OF VARIOUS OCCUPATIONS 


Name of Dance 


Nationality of Dance 


Carousel (Riding in 






the Merry-go- 






Round) . . . 


Swedish 




English and Roman 






Soldiers . . . 


Traditional 


Singing Game 



Appendix 



259 



Name oj Dance 

Jolly is the Miller . 
King of France . 
Milking Pails . 
Mountain March 
Oxdans (mock fight) 
Sailor's Hornpipe . 
Shepherds, Hey 
Shoemaker's Dance 
Tailor's Dance . 
Washing Song and 

Dance 
Weaving Dance 



Nationality of Dance 
Traditional Singing Game 
Traditional Singing Game 
English Singing Game 
Norwegian 
Swedish 
English Navy 

English (Morris Dance) 
Danish 
Swedish Singing Game 

Swedish Singing Game 
Swedish 



DANCES SUITABLE FOR SPECIAL OCCASIONS 



Special Occasion Name of Dance 

Christmas .... Christmas Time 

1. " Book of Song Games and Ball Games." 
31. "Song Plays." 
Christmas .... Christmas Dance 

14. "Guild of Play Book of Festival and 
Dance." 

Easter Christmas Time (last 

stanza sung first) 
1. " Book of Song Games and Ball Games." 
31. "Song Plays." 



260 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Special Occasion Name of Dance 

Farewell To-day is the First of 

May. (2nd part.) (Sub- 
stitute any other special 
day.) The second stanza 
contains the farewell. 
31. "Song Plays." 
Fourth of July . . Minuet 

14. " Guild of Play Book of Festival and Dance." 
Fourth of July . . Indian Dance 

17. "Indian Dances." 
Greeting .... Danish Greeting Dance 

10. " Folk Dances." 

Greeting .... Gustaf's Skol (Toast to 
Gustaf) 

11. "Folk Dances and Games." 

Greeting .... How Do You Do, My 
Partner ? 
29. "Popular Folk Games and Dances." 
Greeting .... How Do You Do, Sir? 

21. "The Morris Book." 
Greeting .... Kull Dance 

10. "Folk Dances." 
Greeting . . . Nigare Polska 

33. "Swedish Recreative Exercises for Schools 
and Playgrounds." 
Hallowe'en .... Hallowe'en 

1. "Book of Song Games and Ball Games." 



Appendix 261 

Special Occasion Name of Dance 

Harvest Time . . Finnish Harvest Dance 

11. "Folk Dances and Games." 
Harvest Time . . French Vintage Dance 

11. " Folk Dances and Games." 
Harvest Time . . Reap the Flax 

33. *' Swedish Recreative Exercises for Schools 
and Playgrounds." 
Harvest Time . . Oats, Peas, Beans 

4. " Children's Singing Games." 
Harvest Time . . Mow, Mow the Oats 

4. "Children's Singing Games." 
Rejoicing .... Carousel 

31. "Song Plays." 
Rejoicing .... I See You 

31. "Song Plays." 
Rejoicing .... Tarantella 
9. " Folk Dance Music." 
10. " Folk Dances." 
Springtime .... Bean Setting and Other 
Morris Dances 
21. "The Morris Book." 
Springtime .... Cornish May Dance 

29. "Popular Folk Games and Dances." 
Springtime .... Maypole Dance 

14. "Guild of Play Book of Festival and 
Dance." 



262 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Special Occasion Name of Dance 

Springtime .... To-day is the First of May 

31. "Song Plays." 
St. Patrick's Day . . Irish Jig 
9. "Folk Dance Music." 

10. " Folk Dances." 
St. Patrick's Day . . Irish Lilt 

12. "Folk Dances for Men." 
Washington's Birthday . Minuet 

14. "Guild of Play Book of Festival and 
Dance." 
Washington's Birthday . Indian Dance 

17. " Indian Dances." 

books on folk dancing 

1. Book of Song Games and Ball Games. 
Kate F. Brenner. 

Published by George Philip and Son, 32 Fleet 
St., E. C, London, England. Price, 3 shilHngs, 
6 pence. 

Contains music and descriptions of twenty-one 
Swedish ring games, with words translated and 
altered, so as to be more suitable for school chil- 
dren. 

Among them are: 

Christmas Time Hallowe'en 



Appendix 263 

2. Children's Singing Games (First and Second 
Series). 

Alice B. Gomme. 

Published by David Nutt, 57 Long Acre, W. C, 
London, England. Price, 3 shillings, 6 pence. 

Contains a clear and definite description of music 
for about a dozen of the traditional children's 
games of England. Among them are: 

Green Gravel Milking Pails 

When I Was a Young Girl 

3. Characteristic Songs and Dances of Aul 
Nations. 

James DuflF Brown and Alfred Moffat. 

Published by Bayley and Ferguson, 2 Gt. Marl- 
borough St., London, England. Price $2.25. 

Contains songs of all nations, a small proportion 
of them folk dance melodies. There are a few 
notes on the general character of some of the dances, 
but no descriptions of the dances themselves are 
given. 

4. Children's Singing Games. 
Mari R. Hofer. 

Published by A. Flanagan Company, 266 Wabash 
Ave., Chicago, 111. Price, 50 cents. 



264 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

Contains, among others, music and descriptions 
of: 
Oats, Peas, Beans Mow, Mow the Oats. 

5. Dance Songs of the Nations. 
Oscar Duryea. 

Published by Oscar Duryea, 200 West 72d St., 
New York City. Price, $2. 

6. Dancing. 
Mrs. Lily Grove. 

Published by Longmans, Green and Co., 91 

Fifth Ave., New York City. Price, $2.50. 
Contains a few folk dance descriptions. 

7. Danish Folk Dance Music. 

Published by the Danish Folk Dance Society, 
Denmark. Obtainable of G. E. Stechert and 
Co., 129 West 20th St., New York City. Price, 
$1.50. 

Contains the music to the dances described in 
" Old Danish Folk Dances." 

8. Folk Dance Book, The. 
Dr. C. Ward Crampton. 

Published by A. S. Barnes and Co., 11 East 24th 
St., New York City. Price, $1.50. 



Appendix 265 

Contains, among others, music and description of: 
Trollen 

9. Folk Dance Music. 
Elizabeth Burchenal and Dr. C. Ward Crampton. 
Published by G. Schirmer, 35 Union Square, 
New York City. Price: paper, $1.50; cloth, 

$2. 

Contains seventy-six folk dance melodies. Among 
others, the most popular are the following folk 
dances : 

Comarinskaia Komarno Tarantella 

Irish Jig Strasak 

10. Folk Dances. 
Elizabeth Burchenal. 

Published by G. Schirmer, 35 Union Square, 
New York City. Price, $1.50. 

Contains dance music, descriptions and illustra- 
tions of twenty-five of the folk dances introduced 
by the author in the Public Schools Athletic League 
of New York City. Among others are: 
Comarinskaia Ma's Little Pigs 

Csardas Scottish Reel and Fling 

Irish Jig Strasak 

KuU Dance Tarantella 



266 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

11. Folk Dances and Games. 
Caroline Crawford. 

Published by A. S. Barnes and Co., 11 East 24th 
St., New York City. Price, $1.50. 

Contains, among others, music and descriptions of: 
Bounding Heart French Vintage Dance 

Finnish Harvest Dance Gustaf 's Skol 
Highland Schottische 

12. Folk Dances for Men. 

Published in Physical Training, a monthly 
journal of the Young Men's Christian Asso- 
ciation, 124 East 28th St., New York City, 
March, April, May and June, 1908. Price, 
15 cents per copy. 

Contains music and descriptions of dances found 
useful for men. Among them are: 
Comarinskaia Irish Lilt 

Jumping Jack 

13. Grammar of the Art of Dancing. 
Translated from the German by Frederick A. 

Zorn. Price, $10. 

This is the most complete work on the technique 
of dancing. It also suggests various national dance 
characteristics. 



/ Appendix 267 

14. Guild of Play Book of Festival and Dance. 
G. T. Kimmins. 

Published by J. Cur wen and Sons, 24 Berners St., 
W., London, England. Price, 5 shillings. 

Contains music and descriptions of old English 
dances arranged by Mrs. M. H. Woolnoth and 
danced at Bermondsey Settlement in London, by 
the Children of the Guild of Play. Among others 
are the following : 
Christmas Dances Minuet 

Maypole Dance Spring Flower Dance 

Welsh Dance 

15. Gymnastic Dancing. 
Mary Wood Hinman. 

Published by Mary Wood Hinman, University of 
Chicago High School, Chicago, 111. Price, 

$2. 

Contains music and a number of folk dances, 
mostly Swedish. Notes on the accompanying dances 
are given with each piece of music, but are of use 
only to those who are familiar with the dances. 
They are not intended as descriptions. The only 
dances that could be followed from the notes are: 

Doves Hey, Little Lassie 

Nursery Rhymes 



268 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

16. History of Dancing, A. 
Gaston Vuillier. 

Out of print, but some copies can be obtained 

through G. E. Stechert and Co., 129 West 20th 

St., New York City. Price, $4. 

Contains profuse illustrations and gives general 

historical review of the development of the art of 

dancing. 

17. Indian Dances. 

Published by Thomas Charles Co., 80 Wabash 
Ave., Chicago 111. Price, 15 cents. 

18. Lekstugan. 

Hirsch's Forlag, Stockholm, Sweden. 
Obtainable of G. Schirmer, 35 Union Square, 
New York City. Price, $1.50. 

19. Maypole Exercises. 

Published by J. Curwen and Sons, 24 Berners St., 
W., London, England. Price, 1 shilling. 

20. Maypole Possibilities. 
Janette C. Lincoln. 

Published by F. A. Bassette Co., German Build- 
ing, Springfield, Mass. Price, $1. 



Appendix 269 

21. Morris Book, The. 

Cecil J. Sharp and H. C. Macllwaine. 

Published by Novello & Co., 21 East 17th St., 
New York City. Price, $1.25. 

Contains very clear and definite descriptions of 
twelve of the best Morris Dances in England. 
Among them are : 

Bean Setting How Do You Do, Sir ? 

Laudnum Bunches 

22. Morris Dances. 

Collected and edited by John Graham. 
Published by J. Curwen & Sons, 24 Berners St., 
W., London, England. Price, 2 shillings. 

Contains music and descriptions of eleven Morris 
dances, among them: 
Constant Billy Bluff King Hal 

Shepherds, Hey 

23. Morris Dance Tunes (Sets 1 and 2). 
Cecil J. Sharp and H. C. Macllwaine. 

Published by Novello and Co., 21 East 17th St., 

New York City. Price, $1 each. 
Contains music for the dances described in " The 
Morris Book." 



270 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

24. Old Danish Folk Dances. 

A translation by Lida S. Hanson and Laura W. 

Goldsmith, of the Handbook of the Danish 

Folk Dance Society. 
Published by G. E. Stechert & Co., 129 West 

20th St., New York City. Price: description, 

75 cents; music, $2.70; both, $3.45. 

Contains descriptions of forty-four Danish folk 
dances, and is especially useful to those who are 
already familiar with Danish dances. Among 
others the following are described : 
Ace of Diamonds Mountain March 

Shoemaker's Dance 

25. Old Devonshire Dances. 
Mildred Bult. 

Published by J. Curwen & Sons, 24 Berners St., 
W., London, England. Price, 1 shilling. 

Contains music and descriptive outlines of six 
Devonshire dances, among others being: 
The Triumph 

26. Old Familiar Dances with Figures. 
Arranged by C. Gott. 

Published by Oliver Ditson, 150 Tremont St., 
Boston, Mass, Price, 50 cents. 



Appendix 271 

Contains music and descriptive outlines of a 
number of Contra dances and French dances. 

27. Old English Games and Physical Exercises 

(for children). 
Mrs. Florence Kirk. 
Published by Longmans, Green and Co., 91 

Fifth Ave., New York City. Price, 50 cents. 

28. Old Swedish Folk Dances. 

A translation of the Hand Book of the Swedish 

Folk Dance Society. 
Published by Neils Bergquist, Tompkins ville, 

Staten Island, N. Y. Price, 75 cents. 
Contains, among others, descriptions of: 
Clap Dance Varsouvienne 

Oxdans Weaving Dance 

The music for these is found in " Lekstugan." 

29. Popular Folk Games and Dances. 
Mari R. Hofer. 

Published by A. Flanagan Co., 266 Wabash 
Ave., Chicago, 111. Price, 75 cents. 

Contains music and descriptive outlines, among 
them the following : 
Dance of Greeting Twining Wreath 



272 The Healthful Art of Dancing 

30. Singing Games. 
M. C. Gillington. 

Published by J. Curwen and Sons, 24 Berners St., 
W., London, England. Price, 1 shilling. 

31. Song Plays. 
Jakob Bolin. 

Published by Jakob Bolin, 645 Madison Ave., 
New York City. Price, 75 cents. 

Contains, among others, music and descriptions 
of: 

Carousel I See You 

Christmas Time Peter Magnus 

To-day is the First of May Ritsh, Ratsh 

32. Swedish Folk Dances. 

Annie Barr Clapp and C. G. Bjerstedt. 

Published by Annie Barr Clapp, University of 
Nebraska, Lincoln, Neb. Price: description, 
75 cents; music, $1.50; both, $2.25. 

Contains, among others, descriptions of: 
Fjalnas Polska Weaving Dance 

33. Swedish Recreative Exercises for Schools 
and Playgrounds. 

Grace McMillan. 



Appendix 273 

Published by McDougall's Educational Co., 
8 Farringdon Ave., London, E. C, England. 
Price, 2 shillings. 

Contains, among others, music and descriptions 
of: 

Clap Dance Nigare Polska 

Reap the Flax (or Linen Weaving) 
Weaving Dance (or Wool Weaving) 



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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 



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